CSP Athletics

Coach Fletcher Proving Leadership Skills Transcend Basketball

New CSP men’s basketball coach and North Branch, Minn., native Matt Fletcher was hired as the program’s 10th head coach amidst a global pandemic. Despite the challenges presented in front of him, Fletcher hasn’t missed a beat as he’s fully embraced and expanded his leadership role beyond the basketball court.

Interviewed and hired during a statewide shutdown with campus closed not only to the public, but to its own students, staff and faculty, Fletcher was tasked with recruiting to his first roster for the 2020-21 academic year, hiring a staff and finding his way around campus virtually (literally).

“It was a very unique and challenging situation. The hardest part was that we couldn’t meet the players face-to-face for around four months, which made it difficult to build those relationships,” says Fletcher.

Hired on April 6, 2020, Fletcher wasted no time getting his name out there as he was featured on the Twin Cities’ strongest radio signal, WCCO 830 AM on Sports to the Max with Mike Max the following day. A little over a month later, his first hire was made with the addition of his former assistant coach at Bethany Lutheran College, Nick Perrin, added to the staff.

At the end of May, the program announced its first recruiting class under Fletcher that included two Division I transfers and three prep players with one from within the local community at Harding High School.

It was during this same time that the death of George Floyd rocked the Minneapolis-St. Paul community and put the Twin Cities in the national spotlight.

The basketball program was not isolated from the social unrest, with Fletcher displaying his leadership style by increasing the frequency and duration of team Zoom chat sessions. A basketball coach by trade, Fletcher knew during this crisis that basketball could take a back seat with the focus shifting to supporting his student-athletes who are diverse in many respects, including backgrounds and viewpoints.

“I think the biggest thing with social unrest and other topics that come up, you have to make sure the student-athletes are heard because you don’t know how it impacts each guy differently,” says Fletcher. “If you preach a family as a team, you have to have those conversations regardless of how hard they are. In regards to racial injustice, I had to attack that head on and let the guys know we are here for them and that these topics can be talked about as a team. They (the players) have a coaching staff they can come to with their concerns.”

Before he could fully rearrange their office space in the Gangelhoff Center and make it their own, Fletcher teamed up with Macalaster head coach Abe Woldeslassie and the Scots program and CSP alumni Kenny Olafeso, BA '04, MA '07 and Peter Olafeso , BA '03 of Rip City Basketball to host the “Athletes Helping Families” community event.

“There is talking about change, and there is being change—and we wanted to establish action right away. We wanted to help our community, it was in need,” Fletcher says. “We also had the buzz of being a new coaching staff and we used that as an opportunity to galvanize more support.”

The goal of the community drive was to collect a mass quantity of supplies such as clothing, toiletries and food, among other things, and cash donations to help the local community rebuild from the civil unrest that resulted from the aftermath of George Floyd’s death.

With school now in session, Fletcher, Woldeslassie and the Olafeso twins once again teamed up for another community drive, “Athletes Helping Students,” aimed at collecting school supplies and funds for local students in need.

Individual workouts shifted to small group training sessions on the court with masks, social distancing and coaches wearing gloves to limit as much spread potential as possible. As fall has progressed and students fell into a routine with their course load, the team was able to pick up its intensity and training on the court.

All the program needs now is a schedule for what is expected to be a shortened 2021 NSIC basketball season while the NCAA decides when and if it will hold its winter championships.

Fletcher has also secured verbal commitments in advance of National Signing Day, showing his ability to evaluate talent and build the relationships necessary to build a fall recruiting class on short notice.