Greg Tonagel - Indiana Wesleyan University Men's Basketball Coach on 500 career wins and coaching with purpose
Sports Spectrum Podcast
Sports Spectrum
5 • 661 Ratings
🗓️ 26 January 2024
⏱️ 38 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Greg Tonagel is the men's basketball coach at Indiana Wesleyan University in Marion, Indiana. Since arriving as their head coach in 2005, Tonagel has led the Wildcats to three NAIA national championships and in October 2023, became the youngest coach in college basketball history (NCAA or NAIA) to win 500 career games.
As a player, Tonagel was coached by the legendary Homer Drew at Valparaiso University, where he was a two-time team captain and started all four seasons.
Today on the podcast, we talk to Greg Tonagel about achieving 500 wins, remaining Christ-like as a coach, his "I am Third" model of leadership and his coaching future.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | What's up, guys, today on the show, Greg Tonigal from Indiana Wesleyan University. |
| 0:04.5 | He's their men's basketball coach. |
| 0:06.3 | He joins us here today on the show, and he's probably the best coach in college basketball |
| 0:11.2 | that you don't know about, that you've never heard of. |
| 0:14.5 | And just back in late October, at age 42, Greg Tonigal became the youngest coach in college |
| 0:20.2 | basketball history to reach 500 wins. |
| 0:25.5 | He also is the fourth coach all time in fewest number of games to reach 500 wins. |
| 0:33.3 | He did this in 629 games. |
| 0:38.3 | And how about that, right? |
| 0:39.4 | Greg Tonigal at the NAA level is doing big things in college basketball, a three-time NAA |
| 0:47.6 | national champion in 2014, 2016, and then 2018, which happens to be the year that I got to meet Greg Tonigal. We had him on this |
| 0:57.3 | podcast and then I got to take a trip to Marion, Indiana, to Indiana Wesleyan and see this culture |
| 1:03.7 | that they had built, this culture of living third. God first, other second, ourselves third. I am third. When I saw that, it impacted me |
| 1:15.5 | greatly. And not only that, a few years later, my daughter decides to go to college at Indiana Wesleyan, |
| 1:22.6 | which makes this relationship even more unique. And so recently I got to go see my daughter and make a trip out |
| 1:28.5 | to Marion, Indiana, and sit down in person with Coach Greg Tonigal the day after they had |
| 1:34.5 | achieved a pretty good victory. And I got to sit down in person at the Indiana Wesleyan |
| 1:41.1 | podcast studios, if you will, in Marion, Indiana, and tape this conversation |
| 1:46.0 | with Coach Greg Tonigle. It's an awesome conversation. It's coming up in just a moment here on |
| 1:51.8 | Sports Spectrum. First, I want to remind you about our Sports Spectrum magazine. You can check it out |
| 1:57.1 | at Sportspectrum.com, and you can subscribe right now. You can get a one year |
| 2:01.1 | subscription to the sports spectrum magazine. It's super affordable. It's perfect for the kids. |
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