One of the most influential people in the history of Widener Athletics, Fred Dohrmann enters his 41st season on staff and 40th as head coach of the softball program. He has amassed more than 650 career victories, which is the most wins by one coach in one sport in school history.
Dohrmann got his team off to a hot start in 2020, going 6-2 and winning the first five games of the Pride's annual trip to Florida for the NTC Games before the season was cut short due to COVID-19.
Despite the loss of a record-breaking senior class, once again Dohrmann guided the Pride to a strong year im 2019. Widener opened the season with a 4-2 record on its season-opening Florida trip, including a victory against Trine, who advanced to the NCAA Division III Sotball National Championship and ended the season ranked fourth in the NFCA D3 poll. Three players were named All-Conference as Carli Benozich, Jamie Gosselin, and Ally McDowell were all named to the Second Team. The Blue and Gold once again performed well in the postseason, advancing to the MAC Commonwealth Championship Series for the fourth time in five years.
As fantastic as the previous year was, 2017 will remain in the memory of Widener softball for years to come. The Pride went 28-13 and won its first MAC Commonwealth Championship, sweeping through the tournament including a win against No. 7 Messiah in the semifinals. The conference championship win secured Widener's first ever trip to the NCAA Tournament where the Blue and Gold won a pair of games. Five players were named All-Conference including First Team selections Katie Sterling and Ally Horvath with the latter also garnering All-East Region Third Team accolades. Widener also excelled in the classroom with six student-athletes registering a 3.5 GPA or higher to earn NFCA Scholar-Athlete status.
The spring of 2016 was one of the most memorable for Dohrmann and the Widener softball team. The program won a school-record 31 games, advanced to the Middle Atlantic Conference Commonwealth championship contest (falling to national runner-up Messiah), and more importantly registered a 3.47 team GPA during the spring semester. In addition, the team produced the Class of 2016 Valedictorian and a CoSIDA Academic All-America First Team selection in Alie Alkins as well as a program-record four players who made the NFCA All-East Region squad and a league-best three student-athletes who were named to the Academic All-MAC Team.
One of the most personable and affable people on campus, Dohrmann has guided the Pride to 13 20-win seasons (1995, 1996, 1998, 2003, 2004, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2012, 2014, 2015 & 2016) and notched a pair of milestones in a doubleheader against Neumann on Apr. 23, 2014. He first recorded his 537th win to pass former men’s basketball coach C. Alan Rowe for most victories in school history for one sport in the opener before coaching his 1,000th game in the nightcap.
Dohrmann’s teams have been especially strong over the past nine years, which began with the 2008 squad sharing the Commonwealth Conference regular season title and winning what was a school-record 30 games at the time. The 2009 squad followed up by notching 24 victories and advancing to the conference tournament finals for the first time in the program’s history, and the 2010 team won 27 games and qualified for the conference tournament. The Pride will enter the 2017 campaign having won 77 games over the last three years.
Dohrmann has also produced numerous all-conference athletes, including the conference Player of the Year in 1992, 1998, 2000 and 2008. Mallory Meyer, his most recent honoree, was also named the Philadelphia Inquirer Academic All-Area Softball Student-Athlete of the Year. In addition, Dohrmann mentored a second team All-American in 2000 and 2001, and another student-athlete won the NCAA Division III slugging percentage title in 1992.
The success of the program has gone beyond the playing field. Dohrmann put together a team in 2013 that had a 3.433 GPA, which was the 24th-best among reporting Division III schools on the National Fastpitch Coaches Association (NFCA) All-Academic Team. That squad also had nine players named All-America Scholar-Athletes. The 2006 team had a 3.248 GPA and was 37th in the country. The 2007 team ended 49th and had seven tabbed NFCA All-America Scholar-Athletes. In 2008, Widener saw seven of its athletes receive the honor before the 2009 and 2010 groups each had nine earn the recognition.
Dohrmann’s service to the athletics department goes beyond softball. He was the assistant men’s soccer and wrestling coach upon his arrival before taking over as head men’s soccer coach for 23 seasons between 1981 and 2003.
A native of Philadelphia, Dohrmann earned a bachelor’s degree in health, physical education and recreation from Pittsburgh in 1978 and attained a master’s in physical education from West Chester in 1986. He is professionally affiliated with the National Softball Coaches Association and American Alliance for Health, Physical Education, Recreation and Dance.
