Joseph Julius Legerski (born July 24, 1957) is the retired former head women's basketball coach at the

University of Wyoming The University of Wyoming (UW) is a public land-grant research university in Laramie, Wyoming. It was founded in March 1886, four years before the territory was admitted as the 44th state, and opened in September 1887. The University of Wyoming ...

Coaching career

Legerski earned a Bachelor of Science degree in business education from the

in 1979. After graduating from Wyoming, Legerski became a boys' varsity basketball assistant coach at

Rock Springs High School Rock Springs High School is a high school campus located in Rock Springs, Wyoming, United States. Campus The Rock Springs High School campus is situated at Latitude: 41.591183 Longitude: -109.20701 within the City of Rock Springs, Wyoming. The ...

, a position he would hold for five seasons. From 1984 to 1986, Legerski was the head women's basketball coach at

. Following one season as head women's basketball coach at Western Wyoming Community College, Legerski was an assistant with the

Wyoming Cowgirls basketball The Wyoming Cowgirls basketball team is a women's college basketball team at the University of Wyoming in Laramie, Wyoming. Competing in the Mountain West Conference, the organization has a tradition dating back to 1973. History The program ...

team from 1987 through 1991. From 1992 to 2003, Legerski was assistant coach at the

University of Utah The University of Utah (U of U, UofU, or simply The U) is a public research university in Salt Lake City, Utah. It is the flagship institution of the Utah System of Higher Education. The university was established in 1850 as the University of De ...

under Elaine Elliott; he was associate head coach from 1998 to 2003. During his time as an assistant, Utah won three conference tournament championships between the

Western Athletic Conference The Western Athletic Conference (WAC) is an NCAA Division I conference. The WAC covers a broad expanse of the western United States with member institutions located in Arizona, California, New Mexico, Utah, Washington (state), Washington, and Texa ...

(1991 and 1995) and Mountain West Conference (2000). Named head coach at Wyoming on May 1, 2003, Legerski was the sixth head coach in team history and is the winningest coach in Wyoming history. He led the Cowgirls to ten 20+ winning seasons, 8 appearances in the WNIT, and 1 appearance in the NCAA tournament. He also led the Cowgirls to the only postseason tournament championship in program history, the 2007 WNIT. During the 2018–2019 season Legerski won his 300th career game as the head coach of the Cowgirls. He was the first coach in program history to reach 300 career wins. He also took the team to their first ever Mountain West Tournament Championship appearance in the 2018–2019 season. He won 3 Mountain West Conference coach of the year awards, in the 2003–04, 2016–17, and 2017–18 seasons. On April 24, 2019, Legerski announced that he would not be returning for the next season, as he planned to retire from coaching after 16 years.

Personal life

Legerski is married and has three children, including stepson Zane Beadles, a former

NFL The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league that consists of 32 teams, divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the major ...

offensive guard.

Head coaching record

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Legerski, Joe 1957 births Living people American women's basketball coaches Basketball coaches from Wyoming High school basketball coaches in the United States Junior college women's basketball coaches in the United States People from Rock Springs, Wyoming University of Wyoming alumni Utah Utes women's basketball coaches Wyoming Cowgirls basketball coaches