Head Coach Steve Moore

Phone: (330) 263-2176
e-mail: smoore@wooster.edu

Quite simply one of the most successful basketball coaches in NCAA Division III history, Steve Moore has amassed a 27-year career record of 577-178, including an extraordinary mark of 490-113 the past  21 seasons at The College of Wooster, which puts him tied for No. 5 in wins among active coaches in Div. III and tied for 8th all-time.

The winningest coach at Wooster’s tradition-rich program, Moore has directed the Fighting Scots to 16 NCAA Tournament berths and a league-high 11 North Coast Athletic Conference championships, while compiling a winning percentage of .813.

Wooster’s recent stretch has been most impressive, as they’ve won 25 or more games seven times over the last 10 seasons, highlighted by advancing to the Div. III “Final Four” in both 2002-03 and 2006-07, winning a school-record 30 games (30-3) in the former. The Scots are currently the NCAA’s winningest team (all divisions) of the 2000s with a 232-38 record (.859), and also of note, reached the “Elite Eight” of the NCAA tourney in 2003-04 and the “Sweet 16” in 1998-99 and 1999-00.

Moore came to Wooster just prior to the 1987-88 season, and his presence resulted in an immediate and dramatic impact on the program. Despite inheriting a team that had finished 8-18 the year before, Moore quickly transformed the Scots back into a winner. Wooster improved to 14-11 the very next year – the first of 21 consecutive winning seasons – including an average of 23 wins per year during the 1990s.

For his efforts, Moore has been named NCAC Coach of the Year on seven occasions (1990-91, 1991-92, 1997-98, 1998-99, 1999-00, 2002-03, 2006-07) and the NABC District Coach of the Year for the Great Lakes Region four times (1990-91, 1999-00, 2002-03, 2006-07). Also following the 2002-03 season, he was voted the Ohio College Basketball Coach of the Year, an annual recognition coordinated and sponsored by the Columbus Dispatch, and in April 2008, the NABC presented him a prestigious “Guardian of the Game” award for education, an honor also once bestowed to the legendary John Wooden.

Moore, 56, has had the magic touch throughout his coaching career, as he owns a career win percentage of .764, ranking him No. 1 in that category among active coaches in Division III (No. 2 all-time, only behind current Univ. of Wisconsin coach Bo Ryan).

Prior to coming to Wooster, Moore guided Muhlenberg College in Allentown, Pa., to successive Middle Atlantic Conference titles in the 1984-85 and 1985-86 seasons. Other highlights for Moore during his time with the Mules included leading Muhlenberg to its first 20-win season in 40 years in 1985-86 and being selected as the MAC Southern Division Coach of the Year in 1983.

From 1976-81, Moore served as an assistant coach at his alma mater – Wittenberg University. During that five-year period, he helped lead the Tigers to four regular season Ohio Athletic Conference championships, two OAC Tournament titles, and a national championship in 1977.

A native of Monroeville, Ohio, Moore was a standout on Wittenberg’s basketball team in the early 1970s. The three-year letterwinner was part of three-straight OAC championship teams, including 1974 when he was a team captain and the starting point guard.

Following graduation from Wittenberg in 1974, he earned a master’s degree in physical education from Ohio University in 1976, while serving as a graduate assistant coach in basketball for the Bobcats.

In addition to all his success on the court, Moore is a member of the prestigious NCAA rules committee, the NABC Congress, and the NABC ethics committee, and the Wooster basketball program holds several community service initiatives each year. Included among those are basketball skills’ clinics for local youth, fundraisers for Coaches vs. Cancer as well as encouraging fans to donate food and clothing in lieu of admission at its two annual tournaments, which benefits People-to-People ministry and Goodwill Industries, and participation in the NABC Dream to Read program with local elementary schools.

Steve and his wife, Jane, reside in Wooster, and have two daughters. Beth, a 2003 Wooster graduate and four-year setter for the Scots’ volleyball team, is employed as a school psychologist in the Clyde school district. Emily earned a bachelor’s degree in communication studies from Wooster in 2005 while running on the Scots’ cross country and track teams, and is now taking postgraduate classes at the University of Akron.