Seattle University Volleyball has a new leader in the locker room. Former Saint Martin’s University Volleyball head coach Dan Behnke was named the Redhawks’ head coach Jan. 10. Behnke coached at two Texas institutions—Huston-Tillotson University and Texas State University—before coaching at Saint Martin’s for four seasons prior to his hiring at Seattle U.
The decision came two months after the team parted ways with coach Michelle Cole following a tumultuous few seasons, fraught with losing years and discord between players and the coaching staff. The team hasn’t had a winning season since 2015, with just four wins at home in the last four seasons.
Behnke has experience in bringing a winning culture to a struggling program. Saint Martin’s, a Division II school, had never seen a season where they finished within five games of a winning record in program history. Under Behnke’s leadership, the Saints worked closer and closer to that .500 mark before going 17-11 in 2023—shattering the previous win record.
Behnke spoke with The Spectator Jan. 16, prior to beginning his duties as head coach at Seattle U. The following is a condensed excerpt of that interview. Questions are paraphrased for brevity.
QA: How long have you been coaching and did your experiences as a collegiate player get you into coaching?
DB: “I’ve probably been coaching for close to 18 years… I played three years of club volleyball for University of Wisconsin-Stout. I played for a brief time in high school… I was a basketball player, that was my thing, that was my go-to. When I got to college, tried out for the team, didn’t make the basketball team and heard there was a men’s club (volleyball) team on campus. The very next year, my sophomore year, I tried out and made it. And yeah, never looked back. I’ll never regret that transition and pivoting to kind of a different sport and path for me.”
QA: What have you learned at Saint Martin’s, in terms of turning around a culture, that you can bring to Seattle U to make this a competitive program?
DB: “Developing our culture and building that out immediately, already started to happen when I met the team… We treat it like a family, that’s kind of what I tell our players and student-athletes—we treat it like a family but yet we have to make business-like decisions. So there’s that component as well… It’s a multi-faceted approach when it comes to building a program and flipping things.”
QA: On a more sensitive matter, how do you build relationships and reestablish trust with players who may have been affected by previous coaching conflicts in the program?
DB: “I definitely don’t want to comment on anything that’s happened in the past. I’m treating every single student-athlete that I work with as if I’m working with them for the first time… I’m going to give them my best in how we go about everything on a daily basis… I just know that what I’ve been doing has worked, and I know things are going to work at Seattle U as well, so it’s exciting.”
QA: How would you describe your style of coaching?
DB: “I’d say I’m more of a calm demeanor, you’re just not going to see me up during a match pacing back and forth. I just really want our student-athletes to see that they have a calm leader and that I can make sound judgment calls when needed—I just think that’s something they’re going to need from me.”
QA: What’s the first thing you think you’ll do when you get to the facility?
DB: “I told all our team members to stop by the office. I want to start getting to know them, I want to know their schedules… Obviously recruiting has to be started immediately, there are just so many different things that we’ll be doing day one… Whatever program I’m in, it’s the whole PowerPoint. It’s got everything… our goals, it has some of our committees that I roll out with the team…”
QA: You have committees on the team?
DB: “Yeah! I set up committees on the team. For instance, we have an apparel committee. So, I’m not the one that’s got to wear the game shoes or the uniform, so why would I be the one to pick out all those items for them to wear? I want them to feel like they have a say and an ownership of this team, it’s not just my team—it is our team… We have a food committee… We have a locker room committee… We have one that is more on the faith side… We have a DEI committee… I love committees, it just serves a ton of purpose and they’re learning and growing in their leadership abilities, so that’s what’s really important to me.”
Behnke plans to hit the ground running in Seattle, but fans will have to wait until fall to see how his early work pays off in this new era of Redhawks volleyball.
