Ray Gooden Position: Head Coach Experience: Eighth Year Alma Mater: Ohio State, 1994

Head coach Ray Gooden begins his eighth season at Northern Illinois after eclipsing the 100-win plateau last year, finishing in the top-three in the Mid-American Conference West Division for the fourth time, and reaching 18 or more wins for the third time in his tenure.

On Sept. 9, 2008, Gooden picked up his 100th win as NIU defeated Western Illinois in Macomb, Ill. to become the fourth coach in program history to hit the century mark in victories. Just over two weeks after that, he watched Meagan Schoenrock put down her 1,000th career kill in a match against Western Michigan, making her the third Huskie to join the 1,000-kill club under Gooden. The other two are at the top of the list as Kate McCullagh (2003-06) is the Huskies' all-time leader with 1,936 kills (second in MAC) and Tera Lobdell (2001-04) ranks second with 1,907 (third in MAC).

Gooden also watched Schoenrock take home an All-MAC honor for the third straight year, something only three other Huskies have accomplished. He leads the program with 11 All-MAC selections under his belt and has the most MAC All-Freshman honorees with his fourth being sophomore Allison McGlaughlin, who like Schoenrock, earned second team All-MAC recognition as a rookie.

Gooden's teams' success on the court is matched by their success in the classroom. His 2008 squad ranked in the top 10 percent of all volleyball programs in the country with a 995 Academic Progress Rate, which was a 21-point increase from last year. Additionally, the 2008 Huskies led all NIU sports programs for the third time in the last four semesters with a Spring 2009 cumulative GPA of 3.324 as NIU athletics as a whole broke the 3.0 GPA mark for the eighth consecutive semester. Additionally, Gooden has had nine players garner Academic All-MAC awards, including five in 2008.

In February, Gooden served as a court coach and evaluator for the National Team tryout in Colorado Springs, Colo. Four Huskies participated in the tryout and Kristin Hoffman was selected to the Youth National A2 Team that competed in the 2009 Global Challenge in Pula, Croatia this summer. Hoffman became the fourth Huskie to compete internationally under Gooden.

Gooden himself is no stranger to the international game as last July he co-coached Bring It!, a team of some of the best 18-21 year-old players in the United States, in the 2008 Global Challenge in Pula.

In addition to coaching with and against some of the best talent in the world, Gooden has also coached some of the best student-athletes to ever compete on Northern Illinois' Victor E. Court.

Two of the players from Gooden's first recruiting class, McCullagh and Gina Guide, were instrumental in helping the Huskies to the 2006 Mid-American Conference West Division title, its first since 2001. Gooden reaped the benefits of the Huskies' strong 2006 showing, as he was selected as the 2006 Co-MAC Coach of the Year.

McCullagh was the 2006 Mid-American Conference Player of the Year and an AVCA honorable mention All-American, while Guide accumulated an astounding 2,249 digs in her career.

Lobdell also thrived under Gooden's tutelage, as she set both the NIU and MAC single-season and career standards for kills with 713 in 2004. As a senior, Lobdell was named to the 2004 All-MAC first team.

While Guide, Lobdell and McCullagh have all ended their collegiate careers, Gooden has refreshed his 2009 team with seven talented newcomers, including four six-footers.

Gooden has spent 15 seasons coaching collegiate volleyball at different levels including five seasons as women's associate head coach and four years as men's assistant coach at Loyola University-Chicago and two campaigns as the head men's coach and assistant women's volleyball coach at Thomas More College in Crestview Hills, Ky.

With Gooden serving as Liz Nelson's recruiting coordinator at Loyola, the Ramblers posted four consecutive 20-win seasons and back-to-back Horizon League (then-Midwestern Collegiate Conference) titles that garnered subsequent berths in the NCAA Tournament.

In addition to his efforts with the Loyola women's squad, Gooden was an assistant to Gordon Mayforth's Rambler men's team. Serving as the blocking coordinator while coaching the team's middle hitters, the LU men finished the 2001 season ranked 14th in the country according to the final USA Today / AVCA Coaches Top 15 Poll with a 19-10 overall mark.

Prior to his stint at Loyola, Gooden spent a season each at Chicago-area schools Lewis and Northwestern as an assistant coach. With Gooden serving as the top assistant, the 1997 Lewis men's squad finished 25-10 overall and ranked 10th nationally by USA Today / AVCA. In 1996 Gooden assisted the Wildcat program, where his responsibilities included setter training, scouting, and coordinating a volleyball-specific strength and conditioning program.

In addition to his time at the collegiate level, Gooden enhanced his résumé with coaching experience at the national level. Since the summer of 1995, the former Ohio State University standout has worked at all levels of the USA Junior National and Youth programs. In 1998, he served as an assistant coach for USA Volleyball's High Performance Camp where he trained 24 of the nation's top 16-and-under players at the Olympic Training facility. In 1999-2000, Gooden also had the opportunity to serve as an assistant coach for the USA Volleyball Men's Junior National Team while assisting with the USA men's program.

Gooden started his coaching career path at the age of 22 as one of the youngest intercollegiate men's head volleyball coaches in NCAA history. In April of 1994, Gooden developed the inaugural men's varsity volleyball team at Thomas More College. While at Thomas More, Gooden not only directed and led the men's program, but he also served as an assistant for the women's team that reached the NCAA Division III Regional Semifinals in 1995 and 1996.

As a player, Gooden earned two varsity volleyball letters at Ohio State and was named an All-Big Ten Conference club performer three times. An eight-time Prairie State Games competitor, he was named a three-time High School/Amateur Athletics Union Junior Olympic All-American and the 1989 Illinois High School Player of the Year out of Evanston High School.

At Ohio State University, Gooden earned a bachelor of arts degree in economics in September 1994. Gooden is married to the former Stephanie Lynn Scarpelli and they have a two-year-old daughter, Gianna Ella, and an infant son, Donovan Isiah.