| Title: | Head Women's Basketball Coach, Associate Athletic Director, Senior Women's Administrator |
| Phone: | 610-861-1424 |
| Email: | spirkm@moravian.edu |
The winningest women’s basketball coach in Moravian history, Mary Beth Spirk, begins her 26th season on the sidelines. Her record of 468-227 ranks her in the top 25 in the nation in victories among active Division III coaches. To say that her teams have been successful would be an understatement. Among the team’s accomplishments during her tenure are: seven Middle Atlantic Southeast titles, three Middle Atlantic South Championships, two Middle Atlantic Conference crowns, seven NCAA bids, three “Sweet 16” appearances, an ECAC Championship in 2007, and most recently the 2010 Landmark Conference Championship. In 2009, she reached the 400 win mark with a victory over Susquehanna University and was recognized at the Final Four in St Louis at a luncheon in which Pat Summit was also honored. Mary Beth would be the first to tell you that her success is attributed to the young women she has had the pleasure to coach. She has coached nineteen 1,000 point scorers, 11 All-Americans, countless All-Conference performers, and a National Player of the Year in Kathy Beck.
The 1991-92 season saw the Lady Greyhounds enjoy the most successful season the college has ever experienced. Their 31-2 campaign culminated in hosting the Final Four, an article in Sports Illustrated and a National Runner-Up finish. Spirk’s efforts that year netted her the Women’s Basketball Coaches Association National Coach of the Year award, as well as MAC and Mid-Atlantic Region Honors.
An eight-time Conference Coach of the Year, Spirk is an ambassador for women’s athletics speaking at local schools as well as attending national conferences on gender equity and Title IX. She has volunteered at the NCAA sponsored “YES Clinic” during the women’s Final Four for two years. The “YES Clinic” provides basketball instruction to under privileged youth in the city of the Final Four. Spirk has been named to the 2011-12 Women’s Basketball Coaches Association Board of Directors, one of only three Division III coaches on the Board, for a second straight year. A 1981 graduate of Dickinson College, Spirk is an associate professor of physical education and has been assistant athletics director since 2001, moving to associate athletics director and senior women's administrator in 2011. She completed her Master’s in Sports Administration at the United States Sports Academy in Alabama in 2002.
