Melissa Young is in her first year at Bethany Lutheran. Prior coming to the VIkings, she coached for six years at Hamline in St. Paul, Minnesota. She left Hamline as the All-Time winningest coach in that programs history.
In just her second season at the helm, Young led the Pipers to their first .500 season since 1996-97. Their fifth place conference finish also earned the squad their first postseason appearance. In 2006-07, Hamline went 13-12 on the year - just the third time the Pipers' finished above .500 in program history. With a 15-11, 12-10 MIAC record in 2008-09, Young led the Pipers to their second consecutive, and third in four years, playoff berth. Her teams finished in the top 20 Academically in the country nearly every year she was there. They also set school and conference records in scoring offense, points in a game, field goal percentage, free throw percentage and many other areas.
Prior to joining Hamline, Young was an assistant at Winona State for two seasons (2002-04), where she also held duties as a professor in the university's health and human performance department. Winona State enjoyed finishing in the top four in the conference both years. She also did a tremendous job recruiting bringing in a McDonalds All-American in Tanisha Gilbert, Miss Iowa Basketball Finalist Anne Straate, JC All-American Angel Leon, and 11 recruits in two years.
Young also served as an assistant coach at the University of Minnesota. There, she helped recruit the likes of Janel McCarville, Shannon Schronrock and Shannon Bolden, who started for the Gophers' 2004 Final Four team. She worked with many aspects of the program while coaching the likes of Lindsay Whalen and Corrin Von Wald, Miss Basketball out of Wisconsin.
Young was the head coach for Anoka, St. Croix Lutheran, Hastings and Nicollet High School, posting a 120-67 record and winning three conference championships. She coached the Minnesota Swoosh AAU team to a 144-45 record over eight seasons, four national tournament appearances finishing 8th in the country. She had over 35 players go on to participate on college teams at University of Rhode Island, North Dakota State, University of Minnesota-Dululth, Princeton, and many other area colleges.
Young was a standout player at Gustavus Adolphus. She was named to the MIAC All-Conference first team in 1992. That year, she set the NCAA Div. III record by hitting 8-of-8 three-point attempts in one contest. She currently holds records at Gustavus and in the MIAC Conference for three point shots made and percentage as well as many records for free-throw percentage. Young also played softball at Gustavus and her team won the conference championship while she played outfield and finished the season with not a single error. Young graduated from Gustavus in 1993 with a degree in health and physical education.
She earned her master's degree in education from Winona State in 2003 finishing on the Dean’s List with a 4.0 GPA.
