Head coach Maura Crowell finished her ninth season behind the Bulldog bench in 2023-24 season after leading UMD to its fourth-straight NCAA Tournament berth in 2024.
Crowell, who became the eighth-ever WCHA coach to log 150 or more wins after reaching the UMD mark on Feb. 18, 2023 is coming off her third straight 20-plus win season. In the past four seasons alone, Crowell has guided UMD to an NCAA title game (2022), two NCAA Frozen Fours (2022, 2021), four NCAA Regional Finals/Quarterfinals appearances and earned six NCAA postseason wins over that span.
In nine complete seasons at UMD, Crowell has an overall record of 174-115-28, including an overall NCAA Tournament record of 6-5 and five NCAA Tournament berths (2024, 2023, 2022, 2021, 2017) to go with two NCAA Frozen Four Appearances (2022, 2021). Crowell has overseen two Patty Kazmaier Top-3 Finalists (Gabbie Hughes and Lara Stalder), as well as a Patty Kazmaier Top-10 Finalist (Élizabeth Giguère). Under Crowell's guidance, UMD has had 94 WCHA Scholar Athletes and a total of 130 WCHA All-Academic Team members. For her efforts during the 2016-17 season, Crowell was named the USCHO Division I Women's Coach of the Year, as well as the the CCM/AHCA Division I Women's Ice Hockey Coach of the Year Award for 2017, and was named a CCM/AHCA Division I Women's Ice Hockey Coach of the Year Finalist in both 2022 and 2021. Crowell was also crowned the 2016-17 WCHA Coach of the Year after she guided UMD to its biggest turnaround in program history with 25-7-5 overall record and the Bulldogs first NCAA Quarterfinal game at home since 2010.
On Crowell's watch, the Bulldogs had an NCAA-high 11 players in the first-ever PWHL draft last September, which included two players in the top-10. Under Crowell, UMD has had nine All-Americans, including goaltender Emma Soderberg and defenseman Ashton Bell in 2022-23. Other All-Americans under Crowell have been Gabbie Hughes and Élizabeth Giguère in 2021-22, as well as Bell, Anna Klein and Soderberg in 2020-21 and two All-Americans in the 2016-17 season (Stalder and Sidney Morin). Crowell's crew has also had a run on league awards over her tenure, most recently highlighted by Soderberg's second WCHA Goaltender of Year honor in 2022-23 after gloving the award in 2020-21. Bell was named the 2020-21 WCHA Defenseman of the Year, four years after Morin earned the accoiade in 2016-17, and the program has landed four WCHA Student Athlete of the Year under Crowell in Clara Van Wieren in 2023-24, Soderberg (2022-23), Catherine Daoust (2017-18), and Morin (2016-17). Soderberg was also a finalist for the 2022-23 WCHA Player of the Year, while Stalder was named the 2016-17 WCHA Player of the Year. UMD has also had 28 players placed on All-WCHA Teams, and tacked on a program-record 15 WCHA Scholar Athletes in 2020-21, as well as a program-high 18 WCHA All-Academic Team members in 2019-20.
UMD finished second in the WCHA in 2020-21, just a point behind eventual winner Wisconsin on the last day of the regular season. The Bulldogs earned 19 WCHA wins in 2016-17, the program's highest since the 2010-11 season, and finished third in the ultra-competitive WCHA (and just three points out of second place), Crowell also helped UMD back into the national rankings, and the Bulldogs reached as a high as second -- where they also finished the 2021-22 season. The Bulldogs were also runners-up in the 2017 WCHA Final Face-Off tournament to the University of Wisconsin, UMD's first trip back to the tournament's final game since the 2012 season.
After taking over as UMD's bench boss on May 1, 2015, Crowell guided UMD back to the WCHA Final Face-Off semifinals after the Bulldogs stunned then No. 7 Bemidji State on the road with a sweep in the opening round of the league playoffs.
Crowell guided two U.S. Under-18 squads to World Championship medals, and most recently led her U.S. U-18 side to a gold medal Jan. 2 with a 2-1 overtime win at the Ice Rink Vlado Dzurilla in Bratislava, Slovakia in the 2020 IIHF U-18 Women's World Championship. Crowell, in her first year at the helm, earned a silver medal silver in Japan in 2019, and has two gold medals as an assistant coach in 2016 and associate head coach in 2018.
Prior to her arrival in Duluth, Crowell spent five seasons at Harvard, including as Harvard's associate head coach in 2014-15 after filling an interim head coaching role in 2013-14. She was a Crimson assistant coach from 2010-13.
In Crowell's final season at Harvard, the Crimson went 27-6-3 overall, captured the ECAC and Ivy League regular season championship and the ECAC playoff crown, and advanced all the way to the NCAA Frozen Four title game. Crowell was an instrumental component of a Harvard program that had qualified for the NCAA Tournament three consecutive winters.
One year earlier, Crowell stepped in for head coach Katey Stone (who spent the 2013-14 season with the USA Women's Olympic Team) and was named a finalist for the 2014 ECAC Coach of the Year award after guiding Harvard to a 23-7-4 record, an Ivy League regular season title, a berth in the ECAC semifinals and the NCAA quarterfinals and a No. 7 ranking in both the USCHO.com and USA Hockey/USA Today polls.
Prior to signing on with the Crimson, Crowell built an impressive resume over five years (2005-10) at the University of Massachusetts-Boston helm. During her time behind the Beacon bench, she rolled up an overall record of 73-53-4 -- making her UMass-Boston's all-time winningest coach -- and helped produce 11 All-Conference selections. In 2009-10, Crowell was chosen the ECAC's Coach of the Year after the Beacons went 17-9-0 in all games and 13-6-0 against ECAC competition.
Crowell's collegiate coaching resume also includes a two-season stint (2003-05) as an assistant coach at Connecticut College, where she helped the Camels to their first first-ever playoff appearance. Crowell came to Connecticut College from St. Mark's School in Southborough, Mass., where she doubled as an assistant women's hockey coach and junior varsity lacrosse coach.
A Mansfield, Mass. native, Crowell enjoyed a rewarding four-year playing career at Colgate University and helped the Raiders to three straight ECAC playoff appearances and a spot in the 2000 ECAC championship game. Crowell — who was part of Colgate's transition from Division III to Division I — earned ECAC All-Academic accolades as a senior assistant team captain in 2001-02, and was awarded an academic prize for excellence in German. She graduated from Colgate in 2002 with a bachelor's degree in German and earned her Master's of the Art of Teaching from Connecticut College in 2005.
Crowell's Collegiate Coaching Experience
2015 - Current - Head Coach, University of Minnesota Duluth
2014-15 - Associate Head Coach, Harvard University
2013-14 - Interim Head Coach, Harvard University
2010-13 - Assistant Coach, Harvard University
2005-10 - Head Coach, University of Massachusetts-Boston
2003-05 - Assistant Coach, Connecticut College
Related Articles on Crowell --
CROWELL IS USCHO'S COACH OF THE YEAR
CROWELL NAMED CCM/AHCA COACH OF THE YEAR, STALDER ALL-AMERICAN
CROWELL NAMED AHCA COACH OF THE YEAR FINALIST
NO. 2 BULLDOGS DOMINATE END OF YEAR WCHA AWARDS
CROWELL AND USA UNDER-18 TAKE HOME WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP GOLD
