The 23-Year-Old Coaching for a National Championship
Meet Erin Matson, the wunderkind in charge of the most dominant program in the NCAA
Erin Matson graduated from the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill last December. She spent the next couple of weeks like any other recent grad: working on her resumé, practicing her interview techniques, stressing about the future. But that’s about where the similarities between Matson and anyone else her age end—because less than six weeks after graduating, Matson received a job offer…to become the head coach for the UNC field hockey team.
You must understand: Maston isn’t just taking over any program. UNC field hockey is perhaps the most dominant in the entire NCAA, and Matson is replacing a legendary head coach, Karen Shelton, who won 10 titles at UNC. “We say our program had a good year if we make it to the Final Four,” Matson once described. It’s as if Kareem Abdul Jabbar, rather than going to the NBA after graduating from UCLA, replaced John Wooden.
While Matson lacked any coaching experience, her application featured a sterling resumé nonetheless. Matson played at UNC for the past 5 seasons (she was granted an extra year of eligibility thanks to a Covid waiver). In that time, she was a 4-time National Champion, a 5-time ACC Champion, and a 3-time national player of the year. In total, she went 99-8 in her college playing career, and after winning the championship her senior year, she posed like Michael Jordan, another Tar Heel legend. Many said that she earned her place on the Tar Heel Mount Rushmore, next to Michael Jordan, Dean Smith, and Mia Hamm.
Matson has long been precocious. She earned a spot on Team USA at only 16, the youngest of all time. As a true freshman, she nabbed All-American honors. “She’s always been hanging out with people older than she is,” her father Brian told Sports Illustrated. “She always played above her age level. Those kinds of experiences helped shape her.”
In many ways, over the past four years, she had become the face of the sport, and with the Olympics coming in 2024, most assumed that she would train to lead the Americans in Paris on the field. But when Matson heard that the UNC job would be open, she decided she had to throw her hat in the ring. “If you had asked me 2-3 years ago, I never would have thought the stars would have aligned like this,” Matson said. “And then they did.” Yes, she was young. Yes, she was a longshot. But this was her dream job. If she didn’t take her chance now, then when might this job open for decades; Shelton had held the job for 41 years, after all.
Matson made it to the final round of the hiring process, where every other candidate was a who’s-who of the field hockey world. She was a familiar face at the UNC athletic department, but when she came in for interviews, all the decision makers say they saw a side of Matson they hadn’t seen before: mature, thoughtful, and ready to lead a program of her own. A few days later, athletic director Bubba Cunningham offered her the job, and Matson was immediately whisked away for photoshoots to announce the news. “I feel like I’ve grown up 10 years in 10 days,” she said after she got the job.
Walk into the UNC field hockey building today, and you’ll immediately notice that things are a bit different with these Tar Heels than with any other team in the country. Taylor Swift blares from the loudspeakers. Players call Matson, “Erin” instead of “Coach” (“It would be very weird if my former roommate was calling me ‘Coach,’” Matson says). On the recruiting trail, Matson can reasonably claim that nobody knows what it’s like to be a student athlete in the age of NIL quite like she does—though parents still might need to be reassured.
Remarkably, it’s working. Matson’s Tar Heels are 4-1 so far, their only loss coming in overtime. If everything goes well, they’ll be playing in the NCAA tournament in November. “I try to describe it and I feel like people think I’m lying when I’m like, ‘It’s going great,’” Matson told the Charlotte Observer. “They’re like, ‘No, where’s the drama?’ We’re pretty drama-free here.”
But there is one thing that Matson hasn’t figured out as a coach.
“I can’t blow a whistle,” she said. “A coach should be able to use a whistle, right? I need some practice. I’ve promised them I’d learn how to do it.”
“But,” she added, “my voice carries.”
😎 We’ve got a new look!
🎾 Seeing Coco Gauff win the US Open last weekend was one of my favorite moments in sports in a long time—especially when she shouted out Venus and Serena Williams. The great Sally Jenkins wrote a beautiful column for the Washington Post about what Gauff’s win means and the power of positive thought. A must-read.
⚽ Chris Jones has long been one of our finest writers. Here he is for ESPN, writing about his son and Lionel Messi. I can’t recommend it enough.
🏈 Andrew Luck has a new job. No, he’s not signing with the Jets. He’s coaching high schoolers in Palo Alto.
🤼 Here’s a fun one. Join GQ’s Jackson Wald on a trip to America’s first Sumo Wrestling club…which is really just a guy’s apartment in Queens.
