Masters in Coaching Podcast- Episode XVII

Tim Cates talks with Concordia University Irvine Athletics Director and Head Softball Crystal Rosenthal about the return of sports and what qualifications and characteristics she looks for when hiring coaches for her athletic department

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
After a successful career playing, shegot into coaching. Now five hundred wins
later, she's also the athletic directorat Concordia University, Irvine. How does
she do it all? We'll findout next on the Masters in Coaching podcast.
Let's go Hi everybody, and thanksfor joining us here on episode seventeen

(00:24):
of the Masters in Coaching podcast oniHeart Radio, where we visit with folks
who have gone through the process andnow are successful administrators, leaders, and
coaches in their respective fields. Andjoining us today is a woman who has
had a lot of success coaching thewomen's softball team at Concordia University Irvine.

(00:44):
She took over in two thousand andnine and cents in has amassed over five
hundred wins. A year ago,she took over as the athletics director at
Concordia University, Irvine. She's gota full plate and we appreciate her time
as she joined just now. Sheis Crystal Rosenthal. Crystal, how are
you. I'm doing great? Thanksso much for having me. It is

(01:07):
my pleasure. Before we get intoeverything, here we are Spring twenty twenty
one. What is the status ofathletics at Concordia University, Irvine. Are
we playing games? We are playingWe actually have gotten through several of our
seasons already, include amends and women'sbasketball, mends and women's soccer. We're
at the tail end of several sports. I actually just left our conference championship

(01:29):
for men's and women's swim. Sowe've had a pretty quote unquote normal year
as much as one can have insouthern California and been really fortunate to compete
in almost every sport. All right, what has the last year been like
for you as an athletics director.You've been a long time softball coach five
hundred plus wins at Concordia University Irvine, but you took on a different role

(01:52):
last March introm athletics director. LastJune you're named the full time athletic director.
What has it been like for youthis last year. Well, it's
certainly been interesting. I've been forthere's not been a lack of work available
to me. It's been challenging,you know, But I say that,
you know, tongue in cheek alittle bit. It's been challenging for the
world, right, So we're nodifferent than anybody else's It's been an interesting

(02:15):
transition to try to figure out howto manage a pandemic and athletics at the
same time, where the nature ofathletics is contact in most sports, and
just deal with mental health of notonly just two athletes, but staff,
faculty, just the unsureness of what'shappening. And I think fortunately have a
great team at Concordia, not justathletics, but just externally as well.

(02:38):
That we we came up with aplan pretty early on in June that we
thought may work for us to getup and running, fully supported by our
administration above us. And it's it'sbeen not the best situation possible for any
of us, but something that wehave managed. I think the best that
we can pandemic is side becoming anathletic extractor. Is that something you thought

(03:01):
you would do eventually? You know, not at this time, was not
in my plan. I was thesenior woman administrator for five years previous to
that, so I was working inupper administration already. You know, I'm
not ready to be done coaching,and that was something I made pretty clear
to my administration that kind of chattedwith me about this job. Once our

(03:21):
softball season was canceled due to COVID, So I think it's not out of
the out of the realm to thinkthat this is something I wanted to do
eventually. I'm very interested in theacademic side of the house too, so
I thought maybe I would shift intosome kind of academic role possibly as as
my body gets older and I geta little I get a little bit more
frazzled at coaching because I just I'mold and grumpy. So I don't know,

(03:42):
you know, God has plans forus, right and I really strongly
believe that, And I felt likethe store was open at a time where
my service might have been needed inthis role, So I decided to accept
it. And I'm so far knockon what survived as an athletics director.
Did you have short term ideas andgoals that you wanted to lement and are
things that you kind of always hadin the back of your mind, Like,
Hey, if when I become athleticsdirector, someday, I want to

(04:05):
implement this, or I want myprograms to have this kind of style,
or I want them to reflect this. Is there any of that kind of
blueprint that you want to put downas athletics director? Well, I think
yeah. I mean, I'm analumni of Concordia as well, so i
have a lot of pride in theinstitution and I'm really proud of being an
Eagle, you know, and I'mproud of all of our programs, and
I think so Obviously, the firstgoal was getting back to competitions, so

(04:27):
that check marked off. But Ithink overall, I would like to see
Concordia be a perennial power in everysport that we participate in. And then
furthermore, I would really love tosee our student asid experience be the absolute
best it can be. You know, My goal as a softball coach when
I took over many years ago wasto just provide a very stable, competitive
experience that people really felt strong aboutwhen they left the suptball programs. So

(04:48):
I just extended that out and notthat our programs haven't already done that in
some places, but I think Isee my role as fighting and working to
getting resources to help everybody achieve thegoals that they have within their own program.
Crystal Rosenthal, athletics director at headsoftball coach at Concordia University of Irvine,
joining us year on the Masters andCoaching podcast. So you get done

(05:08):
playing collegiately, you graduate from collegein two thousand, you get into coaching
at the high school level, clublevel, then you become a college assistant
coach. Two thousand and nine youtake over is the head softball coach at
Concordia University, Irvine. What madeyou decide to go down this path?
Was it something you always wanted todo? Get into coaching. Yeah,

(05:30):
I'm probably like most other twenty oneyear olds graduating. I had zero I
said I had zero. I hada very little plan, and I had
very little money to have a plan, really, so I honestly thought about
possibly going to law school. Thatwas something that was kind of was my
goal. I was kind of workingtowards that. I majored in history and
political clients, so I thought maybe, and I do enjoy school. But
I also my dad was a coach. There's coaching in my family history,

(05:54):
and so I was around sports mywhole life. I am the youngest of
a lot of kids, so I'mjust been around multiples, and so I
think I'm not I'm not shocked thatI turned out to coach. I was.
I'm probably a better coach than Iwas an athlete. I was not
the most gifted athletically, but Iunderstood the game while that I was playing.
So I think, you know,my head coach at the time then

(06:14):
offered me, you know, likea wapping thousand dollars to come work full
time, you know, eighty hoursplus the week to be the assistant coach.
And I thought, oh, thatsounds like a great idea. I'm
not doing anything else. And sothen I started doing that in coaching club,
and then that's where I kind ofdecided like, Okay, I think
this is for me. I'm goingto keep on coaching. You coach club,
you coach at the high school level, you came back as an assistant
coach, and since two thousand andnow you've taken over as the head coach

(06:36):
at Concordia University's women's softball program,and you've got five hundred plus wins now
in your career. Was that evensomething you can comprehend when you took over
the job at some point, I'mgonna have five hundred wins as a head
coach. No, and I'm onlytwenty five. I don't even know how
that happened. No, you know, credit to I have. I've had
a great assistant coach with me alongthe way every year, rosi in Briano,

(06:59):
and and credit to her, she'sbeen probably more instrumental in those five
hundred less lens than I have,to be honest, and we've been fortunate
to have so many great student athletesthat have made that possible. But no,
you don't realize, you know,five hundred wins. It goes fast,
even if maybe the years don't gofast. And no, I guess
for me, I'm very shortsighted.I'm a year. I'm in the moment,
I'm in the day that I'm in. And so when the five hundred

(07:20):
win happened, actually, you know, I'm not dumb. I knew I
was around that mark somewhere because Ihad won four hundred and whatever the year
was that happened, but I don'tfollow like the date, I didn't know.
And so my picture actually threw ano hitter on my five hundred twin,
and so she was really she wasreally excited. She like jumped into
my arms and I was like,yeah, man, we threw a no
hitter. That's awesome. And she'slike and her words, her words,

(07:41):
not mine. She said no,you idiot. You just won your five
hundred game. I was like,oh, all right, well that's awesome.
You threw an all the hitter.What a great day. So it
was. It was a cool moment. And I really do I'm very,
very uh like a reflective kind ofperson, and I really when those kind
of moments happened, I really goback to thank you so much to my
student athletes that I've put up withmy crazy self to make that happen.

(08:01):
Speaking of being reflective, is therea coach, a mentor somebody in your
life over your playing career that youkind of pattern your style afterwards or you've
taken from to make you the coachwho you've become now. Who was that
person or persons that most influenced whoyou are today now as a coach and
administrator and a leader. Yeah,for sure. I mean I think first

(08:22):
and foremost my parents, right andmy dad was a coach. My mom
was not a coach officially, butshe was definitely our coach each one of
us. She's still my coach rightnow. And I think just my personality
who probably lends a little bit.I'm a lot like my parents, probably
equal, So I think my dadwas a very logical. My mom might
not agree with this, so Mom, if you're listening, I'm sorry.
My dad's a very logical, calmkind of guy. My mom was a

(08:46):
little bit more fiery and extremely passionateabout She loves sports as well, so
I think they probably started me off. And then I had a great early
on club coach named Bill Sylvan,and he really taught me the value of
being a great advocate for your foryour your athletes, you know. He
coached me in club softball. Andthen I had a great high school coach
at Elly Christian eleanord Eichstra. She'shistoric, she's one cif a bazillion times.

(09:09):
She taught me what a program lookslike. And then my current associate
head coach Rose and Brown, andI mentioned she coached me a little bit
in club. She taught me whatit was like and teaches me every day
how to coach with detail and thosethings all combined too. And then of
course I watched the greats right PatSummit, and they'll belichick. I'm very
interested, and I'm very interested whenpeople are exceptional at what they do.
So of course you take and youlearn, and there's just been in suing

(09:31):
quests. I shouldn't forget suing quests. She's not only been a great like
a person to watch to emulate,but she's been such a great mentor to
me and really showed me like,always give back. You're never too big
of a deal to give back,and honestly, you're just never a big
deal. So keep grinding out everyday. And she's been a really a
very good personal mentor for me interms of my career and helping me and

(09:52):
guiding and always share her knowledge.So those people for me are probably the
big ones. Crystal Rosen's off letex director and head softball coach at Concordia
University, or it is our guesthere are the Masters in Coaching podcast.
Thanks for being with us. Whenyou look to hire a head coach,
if you've gotten to that point yetfirst year now as ath like director,
we're getting upon that one year anniversarycoming up here in June, or looking

(10:13):
at the coaches, do you have? Are those things that you now want
to have as head coaches when yougo to hire them? Yeah, And
I think you know, there's athousand ways to skin a cat, So
I don't think someone has to havemy style necessarily, But I think there's
all that old saying like you justknow when someone has it. It is
that talent that you know, reallyhard to quantify piece of that somebody presents
or you've teamed through through just thequality of their work. I think ultimately

(10:37):
the cool part of working at ConcordiaUniversity or Irvine is you can have multiple
interests as you work with student athletes, and certainly they're winning, you know,
the academic piece, but we alsohave a spiritual piece that's very important
to us. So you're looking forsomeone with that talent piece that you know
was going to pour into their programin all of those those three major ways.
And I feel like it's not alot different than recruiting. You're looking

(11:00):
for somebody's work, ethic and willand morals and ethics that are going to
kind of match yours. And Ithink that's probably the easiest, easiest way
I can say. It is thehardest part of the job is people,
Right, It's the hardest part ofcoaching is recruiting the people. Because more
than winning a game or pitching onmy mound or playing for space or whatever
you're gonna do, I've got tohang out with this person for four years,

(11:20):
and they've got to hang out withme too. So I'm trying to
find a good match for both parties, and I think that's going to be
the same role I serve in asan athletic director. You're looking for a
good match for the university that's alsoa good match Christian athletes that can also
bring the kind of student athletes toyour institution that you're looking for. Crystal
Rosenthal, athletics director and head softballcoach and Cancordia University, Irvine, our

(11:41):
guest here on the Masters in Coachingpodcast, and a good time to tell
our listeners all about the Masters inCoaching Athletics administration program that can Cordia University,
Irvine the nation's number one Masters inCoaching program. You can choose from
four start dates and complete the coursesone hundred percent online or face to face

(12:01):
or both. Concordia is a Mastersin Coaching program lets you customize your curriculum
and get your master's degree. It'sjust about fifteen months. The next summer
session is going to start on Maytwenty fourth, so the data is coming
up. That's May twenty fourth.Don't wait, go to CUI dot eedu
slash coaching to find out all aboutthe Masters in Coaching Athletics Administration program at

(12:24):
Concordia University Irvine. CUI dot eduslash coaching. Right now, new students
get a thousand dollars scholarships for signingup CUI dot eedu slash coaching. That's
Cui dot eedu slash coaching now.Crystal, you got your degree from Concordia
University, Irvine, and you decidedto go back and get your master's degree

(12:46):
from there as well. Why Whywas it important for you to get that
masters I think at that point inmy career I was looking to become a
head coach, and so I feltlike it was an important component of that.
And then it was just starting.I was in the first cohort at
Concordiam and Vance Tam and doctor vanceDam and he was a part of that
program, the development of that programearly on with Tom White, and I

(13:07):
think just hearing the idea of this, and to be very honest, I
thought like that doesn't sound too bad, Like I think I can manage this,
you know, I think this issomething I could probably coach couch my
club and I could probably manage thisand then when you get into it.
And I'd say this even to thisday because a lot of my friends that
are interested in possibly pursuing this master'sprogram. What it does it is it
has a great curriculum, and it'sreally it helps you grow, but it

(13:28):
really helps you figure out who youare, like who you say you are
versus who you are. And Ithink even in my eighteen months in the
program, even if I look backat my portfolio now, it's like you
really have a chance to constantly reexplore am I who I say I am?
And do I even believe what Iam saying I am saying out loud?
And that helped me so much ina really important part of my career.

(13:50):
You know. It's like your firstclass is like, what are your
goals? And then you look backat your portfolio and you're like, those
goals were not actually that valuable tome, Like now I kind of have
a clear picture. So it's extremelyhelpful if you allow it to be to
pursue yourself to be the best coachthat you can be. It's interesting at
the beginning, you said you wantedto get into coaching, and you felt
like you needed to get your masters. Is that something you would encourage to

(14:13):
people who are maybe looking to takethat next step in their teaching, administrative
or coaching career, get that master, just to agree to further your career
and get to that next level.I think a thousand percent. You know,
I think what I just mentioned isthat any time that you can spend
some time personally developing yourself and pouringinto your craft is excellent. And you're
around like minded people who every coachI was around during that time period in

(14:37):
my life helped me. You know, you learn, and it doesn't matter
if they coach the sport you coach. You're all the same, whether it's
an administrator or a pea teacher.I don't care what it was. You
learn and you grow and it justhelps you. If I could go through
and do it again, you know, because I'm semi considering possibly getting a
doctorate, and I'm just curious toknow, Like, am I crazy?
But I think the part of growthfor a coach, especially because students student

(15:01):
athletes at all levels, they aregoing to change and they will evolve,
and so you have to be alwaysgrowth mindset. Otherwise, to me,
the sport will pass you by becausethe kids are going to get younger and
you're gonna get older. So youhave to learn how to evolve, and
so to me, the only wayto do that is to learn. So
if you don't have a master's degree, man, I can't speak kind of
about pursuing a master's degree in ConcordiaUniversity. For me, gave me exactly

(15:24):
what I was looking for. Youknow, all those years ago, you
teach it a class still in themaster's program. I do. I teach.
I sometimes teach it when non COVID. You're softball class over this summer,
and I've taught to softball class online. So those are the two I've
taught so far. And there's talksmaybe I would, now that I've moved
roles, maybe pick up another one. But yeah, I've definitely taught in
the program. Now that the worldis opening up again as we get a

(15:48):
grasp on COVID and the sports world, as you mentioned at Concordia opened up
a while back, and you guyshave had full seasons and several sports and
in mid season and a lot ofspring sports. What does the future look
like for Concordia University or Vince athleticsdepartment. How excited are you to get
into the next fall season, intothe twenty twenty one, twenty twenty two
and put your your your prints onthis athletics department. Yeah. I think

(16:11):
I'm just excited to return back towhat is, you know, normal,
as much as we can be.I'm certainly don't think COVID is gonna is
gonna go away. I think someof these things are going to exist,
you know, moving forward. Andthat's that's okay, That's what I just
said. You have to learn howto to kind of think on your feet
real fast. But I look justI look forward to We've got a new
president in the institution, We've gota new executive vice president, Tim Model.

(16:34):
We've got a lot of and alot of new people and a lot
of new energy on campus. AndI look forward just to what I've always
enjoyed about Concordia. It's a familyatmosphere, that's a lot of people fully
invested. And I think what thisdid for Concordia, this COVID experience was
really battle test the entire campus.So you kind of got to see who
rose to the top. So nowyou kind of know really who are your

(16:56):
people to go to battle with?And there's a lot of people on our
campus that really really came alongside athletics. So I'm excited in this new found
i guess not new found, buta stronger relationship across campus to see that
we can't take Concordia Athletics as awhole into this new division twour because we're
relatively new and start to compete ata really high level to win some conference
championships, win some national championships,and just to continue to have the great

(17:19):
student athletes that we have. Well, Krystal, we appreciate the time.
Thank you for sharing your story.Thank you for sharing more about Concordia University
Irvine's Masters in Coaching Administrator program.Continued success to you and the athletics department
there and all the programs men andwomen there at Concordia University, Irvine.
Thank you so much for the timeand continue success. Thank you so much,

(17:41):
appreciate your time. That's Crystal Rosenthal, the athletics director at head softball
coach at Concordia University Irvine. Bestto luck to her and her new job
that she took over a year ago, and of course five hundred wives is
the head softball coach, many morestill to come. Well, that's going
to do it for our Masters inCoaching podcast, Episode seventeen. In the
books, remember for all the informationyou're looking for about the Masters in Coaching

(18:04):
Athletics Administration program from Concordia University,Irvine, go to CUI dot eed u
slash Coaching. Cui dot eedu slashCoaching. Summer session starts May twenty fourth.
Find out more about it. Signup, get that one thousand dollars
scholarship CUI dot eedu slash Coaching.Well, that's gonna do it. Until

(18:26):
next time, Tim Kaite saying solong, everybody,