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Luke McGee didn’t know anything about rowing as a freshman at Loyola Academy in Illinois. He “was super competitive” and loved to play team sports, but wasn’t good enough to play for many of the school teams, he said.

But family members and friends suggested he try out for the rowing team. Rowing as a high school sport was rare at the time, so McGee was extremely lucky, he said. Loyola Academy was the only school in a four-hour radius to have rowing — he tried it and instantly loved the challenge.

McGee, the Syracuse women’s rowing head coach, is one of the Atlantic Coast Conference’s most decorated coaches, helping the program become a consistent championship contender. As a rower, McGee competed collegiately at three different schools and was a six-time national team member, coming just short of the Olympic team in two tries. That’s when he began to coach at Brown, one of his alma maters. He went on to coach in the 2016 Olympic games before making his way to Syracuse.

Going into his junior year of high school, McGee tried out for the junior national team. He knew he wanted to compete internationally after watching “Miracle on Ice” through a recording his parents had made for him. In the summer before he went to college, McGee made the junior national team, and later joined the Yale Bulldogs for his freshman season.

“It was the coolest thing, and totally planted the seed of the Olympics in my mind,” McGee said of the movie.

After one season at Yale, he transferred to Brown after sustaining a back injury. With the Bears, he contributed to their wins at the Eastern Springs and the Henley Royal Regatta Ladies Plate. Following Brown, he attended Oxford University for a year, where he was a member of the varsity eight crew that competed in the famous “The Boat Race” against Cambridge.

In the 148th edition of “The Boat Race,” Oxford defeated Cambridge by just three quarters of a length in one of the closest races in history.

Eventually, McGee found his way back to Brown. Bears head coach Paul Cooke offered him a job as the freshman coach at the end of his senior season, without any coaching experience. At the time, Cooke was Brown’s assistant coach when McGee rowed, but became the head coach the year after he left. He also coached McGee on the 1999 U23 team, which he won gold in the eight.

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“(Coaching McGee) gave me an idea of what he would be like as a coach,” Cooke said.

As an athlete, Cooke said McGee had a great mix of being easygoing while knowing when to take things seriously, and he translated that into his coaching style. In his first meeting with the freshman team, McGee told the athletes that they would work extremely hard, Cooke said.

“He framed the situation really well and demanded a lot from his rowers,” Cooke said.

Following three years as the freshman coach at Brown, he became an assistant at Washington, saying that coaching the Pac-12 would allow him to have more resources and strong competition. While he was there, the Huskies won five consecutive national championships with his freshman team winning three in the same span.

“Guys were able to relate to him because of his path,” said Hans Struzyman, who was a freshman at Washington at the time. “His first-hand accounts helped him become a great coach.”

Struzyman recalled one particular instance in his freshman year when McGee showed the freshmen how serious he was about sticking together and winning. About 120 people showed up for tryouts at Washington, but a lot of rowers had already been recruited, meaning most roster spots were cemented. Struzyna said McGee pulled the recruits aside and said “‘Listen. We have to find some guys to be teammates. If you give me one week of this introduction stuff, I’ll reward you.’”

The reward? The team could finally do “good rowing” after doing mixed boats all week, Struzyman said. The team had to show up to the boathouse at 6 a.m. after that, and when one guy didn’t show up, McGee made them do a 10k. Struzyman said that mindset showed how serious McGee was about doing everything as a group.

From 2012-2017, McGee served as the head coach of the United States men’s national team, stressing the same principles at higher intensity, said Struzyman, who was on that team too. At the Regatta of Death, only the top-two finishers qualified for the Olympics. The U.S qualified by a quarter of a second, later finishing in fourth place at the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro.

“I remember getting off the water and seeing Luke (McGee),” Struzyman said. “There weren’t any words said, but we both knew it was a full circle moment, from starting in Washington to qualifying for the biggest stage in the world.”

After coaching for 14 years, McGee became the head coach of Syracuse’s women’s rowing team. In four seasons, Syracuse has qualified for the national championship in two of three years — 2020 was canceled due to COVID-19. The team had the best year in program history in 2021, finishing 10th in the NCAA Championships.

“Luke (McGee) wasn’t afraid to be very direct and open with us,” said Maddy Gordon, former Syracuse rower. “That really contributed to the way we were able to perform, because we had a coach who was committed to his own growth along with ours.”

Later, McGee attended Gordon’s commissioning ceremony, when a commissioning officer requests two influential leaders to pin their newly earned officer rank. Commissioning officers are allowed two people to pin their rank — she chose her dad and McGee.

“He agreed, and was deeply touched by my request,” Gordon said. “It illustrates how much he cared for us beyond just his athletes.”

McGee is constantly adapting at Syracuse, as it’s the first women’s team he has ever coached. When the 2020 season was canceled, McGee provided outlets for mental health professionals to his players.

In just five years, McGee has brought the team to the top of the conference, finishing second at last year’s ACC Championships. And as for the vision asked of the program going forward, McGee has one goal.

“National Champions. It has to be. It can’t be anything less than that,” McGee said.

Published on February 15, 2023 at 11:01 pm

Contact Aiden at: amstepan@syr.edu | @AidenStepansky