It starts at the top with Western Washington University’s women’s rowing team. In her first season as head coach, Courtney Moeller has already created a strong team culture.
Moeller spent nine years as Western’s assistant coach and was a rower during the program’s first national championship in 2005. Being a former player helps give her perspective on some of the outside-of-rowing aspects of being a student athlete.
“I can relate to what it's like to get up early, to balancing all of those things,” Moeller said. “I also bring from my time here as an athlete, is just pride in the program and the sense of being a part of something bigger than just myself.”
Rowing is a completely walk-on sport at Western, so there is no recruitment process. The coaches have to wait for rowers to try out for the team. With a lot of players new to rowing, a lot of work falls onto the coaches to find a player's potential.
“It's more about evaluating people's potential and their coachability, rather than their rowing capabilities at that point,” Moeller said. “My job, and Maddie our assistant coach's job, is to look at people's potential and their athletic ability just in general.”
Another focus of Moeller’s is her rowers academic success above all else. She recognizes that the rowers on the team are students first. Since rowing joined the Great Northwest Athletic Conference in 2020, they have led the conference with 52 all-academic athletes.
“I’m just as proud, if not more proud, about their academic success than their rowing success,” Moeller said. “That's the whole reason that they're here, right?”
Moeller makes school the priority. She teaches them fundamental life skills through rowing that they can apply to their everyday life.
Sarah Plemons, a sophomore on the rowing team, finds Moeller's coaching style and emphasis on academics helpful in the classroom. Both Plemons and Moeller joined this program with zero rowing experience and have found a deep love for it.
Plemons finds that the process of failing and trying again in rowing has helped her manage mastering her classes.
“I feel like that's really similar to the progression of how to find success in rowing,” said Plemons. “Just showing up every day, taking the little steps in order to succeed in the greater picture.”
Sonja Gebhardt, a freshman on the team, finds Moeller’s kind coaching style helpful in creating a healthy dynamic within the team.
“She is very kind and understanding and at the same time very goal-oriented,” Gebhardt said. “[She] reminds us of our goals while keeping the team dynamics really strong, and so there's no division among the team.”
WWU rowing Head Coach Courtney Moeller gives a speech at the rowing hall of fame ceremony on April 5, 2025, in Carver Gym. Moeller competed on the first championship-winning team in 2005. // Photo by Jeff Evans, courtesy of WWU Athletics
Coming into this season, Moeller was leaving the assistant coach role, and she needed someone to fill her place. She went with Western alumna Maddie Bangasser.
Bangasser recognizes Moeller's mental work on and off the water. Rowing, like most sports, is a game of adjustments. You have to fix little things, and it makes a whole world of difference, which is something that takes years to get an eye for.
“She's extremely aware of how the smallest adjustment in equipment might affect a rower's stroke through the water,” Bangasser said. “I just think that is a testament to her depth of knowledge of the sport and how much it matters to her to create the potential for success.”
Moeller has set the tone for what she wants for this program. She has created a culture among her squad that makes rowing as easy as possible when you get up for practice at 4 a.m. Her players want to be there whether they’re going to a competition or not.
“I'm always having fun,” Moeller said. “That's not to say that every day is going to be rainbows and lollipops, but we should still be enjoying ourselves most of the time, because otherwise, what are we doing here?”
Chayton Engelson (he/him) is a sports and recreation reporter for the Front. He is in his first year at Western and is majoring in news/editorial journalism. When he isn’t covering stories, he is usually doing community theater, playing an instrument, or playing basketball with his friends. You can reach him at chaytonengelson.thefront@gmail.com.
