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Pedro Trevino tenure has an assistant coach for a Division I-II team was short before he got a head coaching position.
The Rutgers-Newark athletics department announced Wednesday that Trevino was hired as its men’s volleyball head coach — less than two months after he was named an assistant coach at NJIT.
“I really appreciate [Rutgers-Newark athletics director Mark] Griffin giving me the opportunity to take over the program,” Trevino said in a statement. “My goal is to build off of what the team accomplished last year and maximize the team’s potential to get to the EIVA Finals.”
Rutgers-Newark finished last season in fourth place in the EIVA and reached the conference tournament semifinals before losing to the defending EIVA champions Penn State.
This will be Trevino’s first head coaching position at the college level. However, the coach enters the position well-rooted in New Jersey volleyball.
Trevino spent five years coaching New Jersey high school teams and served last season as an assistant coach for Kean University — a Division III team in New Jersey. The coach also was hired in August to be an assistant coach at NJIT for the upcoming season.
Rutgers-Newark is beginning the process of transitioning to Division III. The school announced earlier this summer that it intended to leave the EIVA and the Division I-II classification by the 2016 season.
In addition, Trevino’s position with the university will not be a full-time staff position. He will be one of the few Division I-II men’s volleyball head coaches in recent history with only a part-time position.
Along with his coaching career in New Jersey, Trevino remains one of the best setters in NJIT program history.
Trevino, a four-year starting setter from 1997-2000, finished his final two season with NJIT in the nation’s top 10 in assists per game average and was selected to the All-EIVA team.
NJIT had a winning record in each of Trevino’s four years with the team. As a junior, Trevino also helped lead the Highlanders to a program-best 24-5 record to the EIVA championship against Penn State — the only time NJIT has ever reached the conference title match.
Trevino at Rutgers-Newark will succeed Karl France, who resigned in August to become an assistant coach at NYU. France in his four seasons with the Scarlet Raiders had a 46-57 career record and the team increased its win total every season.