Andy Zidron

WOOSTER, Ohio – Andy Zidron, who won two North Coast Athletic Conference Tournament titles as an assistant and an NCAC regular season championship as a player at Denison University, will be the next head men's soccer coach at The College of Wooster, announced the school's director of athletics, Keith Beckett, on Monday. Zidron's official start date is June 15.

"I am elated to welcome Coach Zidron as our head men's soccer coach," stated Beckett. "He has a lengthy history of success and excellence within NCAA Div. III and club soccer, and brings considerable passion and motivation into this role. I look forward to the program's future under his guidance."

"I'm very excited, very blessed with this opportunity. I want to thank the search committee and Wooster community in general," said Zidron. "I'm thankful for the past coaches at Wooster for establishing a winning tradition and for the folks at Denison for helping me grow and making this dream of being a head coach a reality."

Zidron has spent the last 14 years associated with Denison's consistently successful program, helping the Big Red to eight top-three finishes in the conference standings and a 154-96-24 overall record (.606) during that time. With him as an assistant coach the past decade, Denison won the NCAC Tournament in both 2006 and 2009, thus receiving the league's automatic berth into the NCAA Div. III Championships field each of those seasons, and recorded eight winning seasons, including 11-4-3 in 2013.

Among his responsibilities, Zidron organized and implemented practice and training plans, broke down game film, identified and recruited student-athletes that matched the school's high academic profile, which is very similar to Wooster's, and developed team culture through defining excellence and goal setting, as well as a team mentorship program. He hopes to implement similar ideas at Wooster.

"I think the big thing for me being a head coach is to develop relationships with the student-athletes, and to bring high energy. That is the one thing we can control, the amount of enthusiasm we bring each day, and that will lead to a competitive culture."

As a player, the Cincinnati, Ohio, native (Anderson High School) was a standout defender for the Big Red. A four-year starter (73 games played), Zidron capped his career with his best season, earning all-NCAC honors for a team that was NCAC co-champions (with Wooster) and went 18-3, the winningest season in school history.

When not spending time on the Denison sideline, Zidron has been a science teacher at Licking Valley High School in Newark, Ohio, since 2005, and coached club teams with the Newark Area Soccer Association and at various camps. He thinks those experiences will be very beneficial.

"I think this transition will be a smooth one," he said. "I've had different experiences with a lot of coaches and being able to connect with them will work to my advantage in recruiting. Working with high school students, I know what they're looking for and what their parents are looking for, and hopefully that's going to be a benefit in not only recruiting, but will translate to better communication and success on the field."

Wooster has an outstanding history in men's soccer, with nine conference championships and six appearances in the NCAA Div. III Championships, and that attracted Zidron to the position.

"When I played at Denison, I remember Wooster hosting the conference tourney and winning championships," he said. "Wooster has all the tools and resources to be at that level again. Competing week-in and week-out in what I think is one of the strongest conferences in the country will be a challenge, but one that I look forward to."

Zidron and his wife, Kelly, have two children, son Owen (4) and daughter Sawyer (2), and they plan to relocate to Wooster this summer.