Volleyball head coach, Mark Ledwich, leads both men’s and women’s volleyball teams here at Dean College. Ledwich’s road to Dean has been an exciting yet unpredictable journey. Ledwich graduated from UMass Lowell, where he was a three-year captain for the River Hawks, who competed at the club level in New England Collegiate Volleyball League. During his freshman year, he started as a libero, before becoming a setter for his final three seasons. After graduating from UMass, he returned to New York where he held coaching stints with Andover Pumas (2008-11), Starlings (2011-12), NYC Impact (2012-13), and The Dalton School (2016-17). In addition, he was the club director of Viper Sports NYC, which was a boys and girls program based in Brooklyn. Ledwich then spent four years as the men’s volleyball head coach at St. Joseph’s College in Brooklyn and varsity coach of the Packer Collegiate Institute in Brooklyn from 2018-2020.
Upon returning to Massachusetts, Ledwich became the Director of Volleyball and Staffing at Mass Premier Courts, and spent the 2020-2021 season as the varsity volleyball coach at Mansfield High School. A year later he was named the head coach of the men’s and women’s volleyball programs at Dean College in August of 2021.
Ledwich is passionate about coaching and he hopes to make a big difference here at Dean. As a player, he realized the importance of trusting a coach. He feels that a coach needs to be direct, and players need to know that the coach believes in them and trusts them. His most influential coach was Nhut Chau: a setters coach in college. He felt Nhut Chau’s ability to coach hard during practice and make things super difficult made game situations so easy because the players were so prepared. He found this type of coaching mesmerizing and helped him become a successful setter. He has coached at all levels of volleyball including club, high school, and college. He’s enjoyed them all because those experiences are similar in that all those levels need to know the strong fundamentals in volleyball. However, they are different because players need to improve their skill levels as the fundamentals of each level increases; they need to take ownership of their skills.
Ledwich sees a change in his coaching between his first year and second year. In his first year, he had to figure out how to fit in into an already existing team system. He was the new guy, and a lot of the players were returning players; he had to figure out how to coach a team that was already put together. In his second year, there were newcomers coming in, and he was part of the existing system, which made him feel more comfortable. His first season at Dean presented a lot of adversity for him. He states, “I was the different person, I was the minority of the group. The second year, I now have relationships with the athletes: when the coach is new, he is figuring out the players, but when the players are new, the coach is figuring out how to insert them in their system.”
Ledwich has seen the team have the ups and downs during practice and during games, he coaches through it all by showing self-respect. In addition, he coaches the “I” out of any individual and shows that no sport is an “I”; in a team sport, an “I” can’t succeed. Ledwich mentions that not only winning the GNAC is his priority, but strengthening the fundamentals high also help, therefore there can be advancement of IQ for the team. The IQ and fundamentals both have increased since last years’ seasons, but Ledwich wants a foundation that will be watched with a future continuing at Dean.
As everybody and everything is growing and changing, Ledwich sees himself adapting more to the new generation. This generation has changed throughout the years, and being able to coach through each one, he has seen the changes on and off the court. Coach Ledwich is far from being done to help volleyball. He is ready to continue to help the team strive in a positive way, help the players on and off the court, and win the GNAC sooner than later.
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