Leeanne Crain, WHS 1984

Leeanne was an outstanding 3-sport athlete at WHS in the Class of 1984.  At UCLA, she earned a Bachelor’s Degree in Psychology while she rowed for the Women’s Crew team. As a senior, she was Team Captain and on the PAC 10 All-Conference Team.  She also earned UCLA’s Outstanding Athlete Award for the sport of Crew.  After graduation, she was assistant coach for UCLA and rowed on the US National Team earning the gold medal in the women’s four at the Cadbury International Regatta in Australia.  In 1993, she became the head coach for University of San Diego, earning 2 West Coast Conference Coach of the Year awards.  In 2003, Leeanne became the head coach at the University of Central Florida. She was there four years until the University of Oklahoma established a rowing program and recruited her to become their first head coach.  She developed their program from scratch, acquiring an entirely new fleet of equipment, designing the new training facilities, and recruiting athletes from around the world.

In just 5 years, the Sooners were crowned Big 12 Conference Champions.  While the team continued to take many medals and championships at various levels, Leeanne, for several years, was named Coach of the Year for the Conference and for the Region.  She is very proud of the academic achievements of her teams.  They earned hundreds of academic awards including All-Big 12 selections, National Scholar-Athlete, Big 12 Academic Achievement awards plus the athletic department’s first Elite 89 Award across all sports at the 2013 Rowing Championships.  She served on the NCAA’s Rowing Committee for 4 years serving as chair of both the NCAA West and NCAA South Regional Advisory Committees.  She retired after 14 years at the U of Oklahoma and is currently living in Visalia.