MSU Denver Athletics

Hank Lewis, the highly-regarded assistant coach who has worked for successful programs at multiple levels, was named MSU Denver's men's soccer coach on Aug. 1, 2019.

Despite being hired just a few weeks before the start of the season, he had his team clicking on all cylinders by season's end, as the Roadrunners won their last five games -- the program's first five-game winning streak since 2015 -- to finish 10-7-1 overall and just missed the RMAC Tournament with an 8-5-1 mark in league play. Though the Roadrunners were seventh in the league standings, had they won one of the games they lost, they would have qualified for the tournament as the second seed.

Under Lewis' tutelage, Yannick Schad returned to All-RMAC first team status, while senior Danny Bautista made the All-RMAC second team and freshman Jerry Gutierrez earned All-RMAC honorable mention. A goalkeeper in his playing days, Lewis oversaw senior first-year starter Alessandro Gentile was within four minutes of setting a school record scoreless streak as he blanked opponents for 386 minutes, 33 seconds late in the season.
 
Lewis had spent the previous two seasons on the staff at Air Force after spending three years as an assistant at Colorado School of Mines. He had returned to Mines as an assistant earlier in 2019.
 
At MSU Denver, Lewis will be building upon a tradition that includes five appearances in the NCAA Division II tournament, four regular-season conference championships and three conference tournament championships.

At Air Force, Lewis was part of a group that was twice named Western Region Coaching Staff of the Year, helping the Falcons to two consecutive Western Athletic Conference regular-season titles as well as two consecutive appearances in the NCAA Tournament.
 
He has worked for top-25 teams across all three NCAA divisions, as has been part of six conference championships, three conference tournament championships and five NCAA Tournament appearances. He helped Colorado School of Mines to the Elite Eight of Division II in 2015 and helped Air Force to the Sweet 16 in 2018.
 
Besides Mines and Air Force, Lewis has also coached at Division III Stevens Tech (N.J.) from 2010-11, where he was also briefly the interim head coach, at Division II Missouri S & T (2007, 2012) and at Division I Colgate (2006-07).
 
He also spent three years (2000-03) on the technical staff of the Bahamas men's national team, coaching in Olympic and World Cup qualifiers. While on staff for the Bahamas Football Association, he served as director of goalkeeper operations, establishing technical and coaching curriculum for Bahamian players and coaches.
 
He finished his playing career as a goalkeeper at 37 in the Bahamas.
 
Lewis has also coached youth teams to three state championships, in two different sports in two different states, and coached soccer tournament champions and finalists on all but two of the U13, U16, U18, and U19 teams he has coached. He was the coach of FC Boulder from July 2012 through May 2013.
 
He holds an NSCAA National Diploma (Distinguished Pass) and a B coaching license from the Bahamas Football Association.
 
He also is an experienced trainer for Positive Coaching Alliance, which reaches millions of children each year to develop and defend a positive experience in club and scholastic sports, and he is an award-winning writer of essays, plays, non-fiction and two critically-acclaimed books of short stories.
 
Lewis spent more than 15 years as a full-time university professor before going into full-time collegiate coaching. Raised by two parents committed to social justice and community development, Lewis has served on advisory boards and panels for a range of state and national non-profit organizations focused on issues from equal rights to arts and education. A fourth-generation Coloradoan, he currently resides in Golden, Colo.