South Dakota State University Athletics
Catching Up with Angie Swenson
2/1/2016 9:26:00 AM | General
Former Jackrabbits standout Angie Swenson took time out of her busy schedule as a coach, wife and mom to visit with GoJacks.com.
What have you been doing since graduating?
“Since graduation, I have been coaching basketball and teaching. Most people start coaching at a lower level and work their way up. Over the 18 years of coaching, I started at the top as an assistant Division I coach at the University of Evansville, then as a junior college head coach, then a high school head coach. I loved and learned from each position and all of the coaches I coached with. I stepped down from each as my family grew. Now, I have the most rewarding coaching position yet, coaching my daughter's youth team. I was a teacher for 14 years and an athletic director before taking a new position in the field of medical devices with Medtronic.”
You spent over 20 years working in athletics as a coach and athletics director. What were the best parts of both jobs?
“I was fortunate to start my coaching career at Deuel High School in Clear Lake as I finished my teaching degree. As a coach, I loved practices and working with each player to develop and expose their skill set to contribute to the teams overall success. As an athletic director, I loved being a coach of coaches, and my favorite part was being at the games and watching the hard work pay off. The hard work of not just the athletes and coaches, but also of the facility workers all coming together to create the event.”
What was your final coaching record at Rochester Public Schools? Any titles?
“I don't know what my record was off the top of my head. We had some great years while I was at Mayo and I was able to coach some really talented and intelligent players. We went to the state tournament twice during my nine years as head coach. I had a very talented group of juniors when I stepped down to coach my own kids. That next season they made it to state again. That was a hard year for me. I really missed that group of girls and coaching that level of play.”
In 1995-96, yourself and teammate Gina Mouw dominated around the basket, blocking a combined 112 shots. Share your thoughts on blocking shots and how the Jackrabbits were able to turn it into offense.
“We did get our hands on a few shots, but the magic came from the others on the court. We would block their shots, our guards would release wide and push the ball down the court. Leah Klaassen was so fast, and ran the floor so well to capitalize on the other end. I was blessed to play with awesome athletes and friends and for coach Nancy Neiber.”
Your junior year the Jackrabbits beat the Coyotes, 109-64, Feb. 16, 1995, in front of 7,031 fans. What was it like playing in front of that many fans?
“It was awesome! I remember coach Neiber played loud music for us during our free throws at our shoot-around that day. The crowd was amazing. The fan base who came to our games is what really sold me on SDSU in the beginning. During my recruiting visit, SDSU was playing USD and the place was packed. I thought it would be so cool to play in front of that many fans. Little did I know then what great people our fans were, devoted to Jackrabbits athletics, and a true supporters of women's basketball.”
What's your favorite memory of SDSU basketball?
“It was my junior year, we had a tough team. North Dakota State, North Dakota and us rotated around atop the national ranking that whole year. Minnesota-Duluth was supposed to have a good team that year, too. They played NDSU in a nonconference game and beat them. The next week UMD was coming to Frost Arena (Nov. 24, 1995). We were so pumped up for that game and knew it was going to be a tough match-up. We had three tenacious guards that year—Erin Reiten, Ann Just and Beth Ommen. Between the three of them, they didn't even let UMD get the ball past half-court. We held them to only nine points at halftime.”
“The North Central Conference was a great conference to play in. The downfall is that we always had to play NDSU one night and UND the next. One weekend going north, we hit a snow storm that was so bad the refs couldn't make it to the game so we had to stay an additional night and play UND on a Sunday afternoon. We ended up beating UND that game on a last-second shot; we only needed a two to tie. I set an on-ball screen for Ann Just at the top of the key thinking she was going to drive down the lane and lay it in or dish it off, and instead she popped in the three for the win.”
