Coaching In A New Place | Brooke Kalman | Drexel

August 6, 2025·42 min·3 clips

Brooke Kalman knew she wanted to be a college softball coach after seeing recruiters at her high school games.

The conversation starts with a career move. Brooke Kalman has just been named head coach at Drexel after her time at Gettysburg College, and the host uses that move to talk about what new head coaches actually inherit. For Kalman, coaching starts with relationships. The transition sounds exciting, but not clean or easy. She is stepping into a group that needs to believe her quickly, and she seems aware that trust will not show up because she has a new title. The roster comes into focus right away. Kalman describes getting on a call with Drexel players while emotional, choosing honesty over a polished first impression. That moment gives the conversation its shape. She is not arriving with a speech and a finished plan. She is setting up Zoom conversations by class year, asking players what they liked, what they did not, and what they want her to understand. The tone stays practical and personal. A five-win season leaves real questions, but Kalman does not talk about the current players like leftovers from someone else's program. She needs them involved now. They can host tours, speak for Drexel, and help bring 2026 and 2027 recruits into the program. With only 17 players, the job gets smaller in one sense and more intense in another. There is room for more individual attention, but also less room to miss what each student-athlete needs. The host keeps the conversation honest about the tradeoff. A coach can be thrilled about a new job and still feel the weight of leaving people and routines behind. Administration stays mostly in the background, through the host's own story about timing and leaving coaching, but it adds useful texture. This episode treats a new head coaching job as more than softball. It is listening, timing, and care people can actually see. Kalman is clear that saying she values players will not be enough. The proof has to come in small choices and steady follow-through. The close turns back toward community, with Joanna Lane pointing listeners to the NFCA convention in Vegas and framing Kalman as approachable, which fits the episode's feel: direct, relational, and built around access.

As heard by us

A rebuild starts with listening, not slogans.

Kalman's appearance on The Dirt turns on a familiar coaching truth: the first job is earning trust. It traces how the Drexel hire followed her stop at Gettysburg College, where she arrived after a regional appearance, and how recruiting first drew her toward coaching in the…

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You want to hear how a newly named Drexel softball head coach opens by listening to a roster that just won five games.

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