Upon her arrival on the North Central College campus in 1985, Marcy Thurwachter immediately assumed many job titles, including those of an administrator and professor in the physical education department, but felt most comfortable in the role of a coach.
As the coach of the Cardinals’ women’s volleyball and track and field programs, she quickly elevated to new competitive heights and inspired student-athletes to aspire to higher levels of success.
She was named North Central’s assistant athletic director in 1991 and associate director in 1994. Thurwachter earned a promotion to associate professor and served as acting department chair before moving on from the College in 2002.
As coach of the Cardinals’ volleyball team from 1985 to 1997, she inherited a team that was sorely in need of numbers to fill the roster and quickly went to work putting together a group of players who would serve as the catalyst for greater success to come.
“When I came to North Central, Al Carius was the athletic director, and he told me I might not have a team that first season,” she said. “The team had gone through some instability and there had not been any recruiting. The admission office gave me a list of women who were planning to attend North Central who had an interest in playing volleyball, but the level of quality was certainly unknown.”
Thurwachter worked the phones and put together her first recruiting class. Several student athletes from that class became integral parts of the team that went from a 10-28 overall record in 1985 to a 24-20 record and a second-place finish in the College Conference of Illinois & Wisconsin (CCIW) in 1988. The program continued to progress and eventually won its first CCIW title in 1992.
“It was interesting, the first year,” Thurwachter said. “Getting to double-digit wins was a big deal for us. It didn’t take long to double that number, get to .500, and by the time they were seniors we had added more quality players. We had our ups and downs, but we fielded pretty competitive teams.”
Thurwachter’s recruiting efforts also served her well as head coach of the women’s track and field team. Her first recruiting class included Ophelia Johnson ’91 and Megan Allen ’90 Gossett, both of whom wound up becoming 12-time All-Americans. Johnson became the Cardinals’ first individual national champion in the 100-meter hurdles in 1989 and was a member of North Central’s first Athletic Hall of Fame induction class in 2004. Gossett was inducted in 2005.
North Central’s women’s track and field program won five CCIW team championships (including the inaugural CCIW women’s meet in 1986) and nine individual and relay national championships in Thurwachter’s tenure, along with 106 All-American certificates and 217 individual CCIW titles. The Cardinals’ ascension to the national level also began during the recruiting process. Thurwachter challenged young women to consider the heights to which they were willing to go.
“I think one of the things that made my signature in the recruiting process was to ask, ‘How good do you want to be?’” she said. “A lot of high school seniors don’t have any idea. In the ‘80s, very few athletes I recruited said they wanted to be an All-American. I don’t know if many of them knew it was an option.
“It took a long time, but once they came to North Central, got into the program and had that first taste of success, their expectations changed dramatically. They had a better grasp of what it took to be successful on the national stage.”
Now assistant director of operations for the Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association, Thurwachter remains in contact with many of the athletes who competed for her, including seven North Central Athletic Hall of Famers.
“The most important thing is the experience of working with people as teenagers and seeing that transition to adulthood,” she said. “It’s a special time in people’s lives and to get a front-row seat is really special.”
