Head coach Brent Noble is out at the University of Evansville after just one season on the job. The school says it will begin searching for a replacement immediately.
Noble was hired on in September of 2018, joining Evansville from Wabash College. His men’s team finished 4th in the Mid-American Conference (MAC) – they were 5th the year prior to his hiring but second-place Eastern Michigan cut its program. The Evansville women were 7th of 8 teams in the Missouri Valley Conference (MVC) this year, same as they were the year prior.
Noble is no longer listed on the team website. The coaching staff lists “TBA TBA” in the head coaching slot. An Evansville spokesperson confirmed that Noble is no longer coaching the program, saying that he “was not meeting the standards of the University of Evansville in the administration of his program.”
We’ve reached out to Noble for comment, but have not yet received a response. Update: Noble responded with the following statement:
“Working with the student athletes at UE was an incredible experience, and they’re a great group of individuals. The position ended up not being the right fit for me overall, though. I’ve learned from the experience, and I look forward to my next opportunity to coach.”
Noble had coached five seasons at Division III Wabash, serving as the head coach for the men’s team there. He was the head men’s and women’s coach at Division I Evansville this past year.
“Not meeting the standards of the University of Evansville in the admininstration of his program” = he went $40,000 over budget this season. Can’t be doing stuff like that 😬 🤷♀️
I heard Kate’s Uber rating is under 3.0, just like her GPA and that is simply someone I cannot trust. FAKE NEWS!!!
Hey Kate, just wondering where you got your numbers from? That’s a big accusation to make so I think everyone would love to know where you got your information!
But how did he go $40K over budget on his own? Where was the sport supervisor who would have been looking at his invoices so s/he could say, “Whoa, Brent…let’s pump the brakes here because we’re burning through cash!” Bring in a D3 coach to a D1 program is tough enough based on the differences in rules. Throw in little supervision and it’s no wonder that it wasn’t a great fit.
The team was shocked because Brent brought such great energy to the team and has recruited such a great class of swimmers coming in. We are committed to moving the team forward through this change and we are hopeful that a new coach will be brought in that has the same commitment to excellence as coach Noble did.
This is a complete shock!! I spent the past several months getting to know Coach Noble and felt like he was about to do big things at UE. Was there something I missed? Can recruits get on the transfer portal or do I have to wait until next fall to do that?
Message to anyone looking at this opening – don’t try to make the program better, the first coach to do so in nearly 20 years got fired for doing just that.