Expected by Whom? - An Analytics & Eye Test Hockey Podcast · Winged Wheel Podcast Network

Michigan Women's Hockey Head Coach Interview - Jenna Trubiano - Ep. 23

·40 min·2 clips

Tribiano says Michigan’s women’s hockey push has existed since the late 1990s, but the program still has no varsity team.

The host opens the show alone because Prashanth is taking a much-deserved vacation after a hectic couple of months. He brings on University of Michigan women's club hockey coach Jenna Tribiano, who is in Fort Worth for work and planning to head back to Detroit that night. The first question is practical: what does it really take to coach the women's club program at Michigan when the job does not pay the bills on its own and another full-time position has to fit alongside it? Tribiano answers from experience and lays out the daily reality of balancing coaching, work, travel, and the steady obligations that come with running a program outside the varsity structure. From there, the conversation turns to women's hockey in Michigan more broadly. The host frames it as an issue that has been building around the state, especially as former players and other hockey people keep pointing to the lack of varsity opportunities for women. ACHA Nationals comes up too, along with earlier conversations about the Board of Regents and the possibility that something more formal could eventually move the issue forward. Tribiano describes her relationship with denise illich as something that began a little over a year ago. She says the work is really about educating and advocating. She also says she lives in a women's hockey bubble, with social media now filled almost entirely with women's hockey and women's sports. That perspective matters to her argument. If the state has seven men's Division I teams and zero women's opportunities, the gap is hard to ignore. She points to former players born and raised in Michigan who had to go play college hockey elsewhere, including players she says are now in the PWHL. She also mentions players from within 30 minutes of Ann Arbor who ended up at Wisconsin. The point, for her, is that someone with actual leverage has to push the issue far enough to get a feasibility study on the table. That study is now the next marker. The episode closes with the hope that within about three to four months there will be another piece of actionable information for women's varsity hockey at the University of Michigan, the host thanks Tribiano before signing off, and Prashanth is due back for the next episode.

As heard by us

A measured look at how Michigan's women's hockey push moves from advocacy to action.

The episode follows University of Michigan women's club hockey coach Jenna Tribiano as she comes in from Fort Worth and balances a full-time job with the work of keeping the program moving.

Read the full review in PlayNext →

Why you'd press play

When you want the Michigan women's hockey push without the chest-thumping.

Read the full recommendation in PlayNext →

Listen to the show on

Apple Podcasts Spotify

Play clips from this episode More from Expected by Whom? - An Analytics & Eye Test Hockey Podcast