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Office: (937) 327-6496
E-mail: nriker@wittenberg.edu
Wittenberg Record: 39-31-6 (2002-present)
Career Record: 50-38-6 (2000, 2002-present)
| Postal Address: Wittenberg University P.O. Box 720 Springfield, Ohio 45501 |
Package Shipping Address: Wittenberg University 225 Fountain Ave. Springfield, Ohio 45504 |
Norm Riker was selected as Wittenberg University women's soccer coach in March 2002, becoming the program's seventh head coach since it became a varsity sport in 1986.
Riker has turned the Tigers into a force in the North Coast Athletic Conference, one of the preeminent women's soccer conferences in all of NCAA Division III. Wittenberg has an outstanding 25-9-5 record in the 2004 and 2005 seasons, including a pair of third-place finishes in the NCAC regular season title chase. The Tigers have been ranked in the top 10 in the Great Lakes Region for most of the last two seasons and even broke into the national top 25 briefly in 2005.
In his first season at the helm, Riker led an injury-depleted team to records of 6-12 overall and 3-5 in the NCAC, which included four nationally ranked teams in 2002. The program made two games' improvement in 2003 and hung tough again with some of the finest teams in the nation. The improvement continued in 2004 when Wittenberg posted an 11-4-5 record, beating nationally ranked Denison on its way to reaching its first-ever NCAC Championship game.
Riker, who was honored with 2004 NCAC Coach of the Year honors, followed that up with a 2005 season that was one of the finest in school history. Wittenberg started the season with eight straight wins and eventually posted a 14-5 overall record. Four of the five losses were to teams that reached the NCAA Division III Tournament, and the Tigers earned victories over three teams that made the national field.
Prior to his arrival at Wittenberg, Riker was the interim head coach of the women's soccer team at Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, N.Y. for the 2000 season, and he also served as the men's lacrosse assistant coach. During the 2000 season, Riker led Vassar to its second Northeast Regional ECAC Championship. He served as an assistant in both programs from 1994 to 1999 and again in 2001, and he also served as the building manager of Walker Fieldhouse on the Vassar campus.
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Norm Riker with his daughters Isabelle (left) and Sofia.
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Riker joined the Wittenberg men's lacrosse program as an assistant coach in 2003 after a year working as an assistant in the women's lacrosse program. He helped the Tiger women's lacrosse team to an 8-6 record in his only year with that program, including a 5-2 mark in the NCAC, which was good for a program-best third place.
A native of Block Island, R.I., Riker was a four-year lacrosse letterwinner at Springfield College (Mass.) after an outstanding high school career in both soccer and lacrosse. He was a captain of Springfield's lacrosse team as a senior, and he was selected to participate in a pair of senior all-star games. He holds a bachelor of arts in history from Springfield, attained in 1992, and he has since attained a master of professional studies in humanistic education from the State University of New York, New Paltz.
Riker lives in Springfield with his wife, Gabrielle, and their children, Isabelle and Sofia.
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Heather Lipp joined the Tiger women's soccer program as an assistant coach in 2004 after serving as head coach at Indiana Senior High School in Indiana, Pa., in 2003.
Lipp is a graduate of Marietta College, where she earned multiple letters and served as team captain of the women's soccer team her junior and senior years. Before earning her degree in advertising from Marietta, Lipp was a standout high school soccer player at Upper St. Clair High School.
Lipp has several years' experience coaching travel league soccer teams in every age group for girls and Under-10 and Under-12 for boys. She was indoor soccer coordinator for Indiana Area Soccer Boosters for four years and coaching coordinator for the same organization from 2001 through 2004. In addition, Lipp has worked numerous summer soccer camps, holds three coaching licenses and is a certified referee. Since moving to Springfield, she added coaching duties with the Dayton Soccer Academy's (DSA) Under-18 girls travel team.
Lipp moved to Springfield in 2004 with her husband, Evan, Wittenberg's associate vice president for enrollment management, and their sons, Cooper and Jake.
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Tom Esler joined the Tiger women's soccer coaching staff in 2004 after 20 years of coaching in the Washington, D.C. area, including nine years as director of coaching for the Damascus Soccer Club in Damascus, Md.
During his time with the Damascus Soccer Club, Esler's duties included identification of coaches and players, forming travel teams, education of coaches, development of team and club philosophies, design of clinics and training session for both field players and goalkeepers. During his tenure there, the club grew from 200 recreation players to more than 1,200 recreation players, 85 coaches and 35 professionally coached travel teams. Notably, he was instrumental in the formation and training of the Damascus Spirit, which won the Under-14 Maryland State Women's Championship, was a Region I finalist and earned a No. 4 ranking nationally.
Esler has coached a variety of travel league teams, both men and women, and he has played in several indoor and outdoor men's leagues, assisted in training local high school teams, and he had a stint with Maryland ODP as an assistant goalkeeper coach under Johns Hopkins University Head Coach Matt Smith. He holds numerous coaching licenses, including the United States Soccer Federation National "B" License. Among his responsibilities with Wittenberg's women's soccer program will be goalkeeper and field player training.
Esler resides in Maryland with his wife, Vendla, and their four sons.
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