STEPHENVILLE – Two-time Division I Conference Coach of the Year and NCAA Tournament head coach Pete Cuadrado has been selected as the first women’s soccer head coach at Tarleton State University, announced Friday by Vice President for Intercollegiate Athletics Lonn Reisman.
Tarleton is set to add women’s soccer in the fall of 2022 and will compete in the Western Athletic Conference. Cuadrado will spend the next year recruiting and putting together a roster and coaching staff before the inaugural Tarleton women’s soccer season in 2022.
Cuadrado spent the last nine seasons as the head women’s soccer coach at the University of Wyoming, where he’s the school’s all-time winningest coach. Cuadrado has been a head coach for the last 18 seasons and a Division I head soccer coach for the last 17 seasons between Wyoming and North Dakota State.
“I want to thank President Dr. James Hurley, Reisman, the entire search committee and all the wonderful people I met on my visit to Stephenville,” said Cuadrado. “I was completely impressed with how the athletic department is a family and how they are moving forward into the Division I transition. It’s exciting and humbling for me to be the first women’s soccer head coach at Tarleton.”
Cuadrado has established success in helping build two separate Division I teams into championship programs, posting a career 168-131-42 record as a head coach. At Wyoming, Cuadrado helped the Cowgirls win the Mountain West Championship in 2018, the first championship in program history. Cuadrado is the only soccer coach in Wyoming history with multiple 10-win seasons, which he has done four times in nine seasons. Cuadrado was also voted Mountain West Conference Coach of the Year in 2014 after leading the Cowgirls to an 8-3 league record.
“We are extremely excited to welcome Pete Cuadrado to Tarleton as the first women’s soccer head coach in school history,” said Reisman. “As the hiring committee went through the impressive list of candidates, Coach Cuadrado’s name continued to rise to the top each time. Pete has won at every level he’s been at, winning championships in the Summit and Mountain West Conferences as a Division I head coach for almost two decades.
“He brings an immediate impact and credibility to this program and the WAC,” Reisman added. “The state of Texas has a strong reputation of producing high-quality women’s soccer student-athletes and we couldn’t think of a better time to add the program with a championship-caliber head coach to lead the way. We are thrilled to have Pete and his family join us at Tarleton as he takes us through the transition process and beyond and I have no doubt he will be tremendously successful, as he has been throughout his career.”
Prior to Wyoming, Cuadrado spent nine seasons as the head coach at North Dakota State from 2003-11 where he helped the Bison transition from NCAA Division II to I in his first season at the helm. Cuadrado left NDSU as the program’s all-time wins leader after winning a pair of conference championships and advanced to the NCAA Tournament in 2010 where they tied with No. 6 Texas A&M 1-1 in the opening round. In 2005, Cuadrado was voted as the NCAA Division I Independent Coach of the Year after a six-win turnaround in his second season at the Division I level. Cuadrado posted double-digit winning seasons in seven of his eight seasons at NDSU, including a 15-3-2 record in his final season in 2011, which is the most wins in a season in school history.
In his career as a head coach, Cuadrado has three regular season conference championships and two coach of the year awards. He has coached three defensive player of the year winners, 51 all-conference selections, 15 all-region selections, 88 conference all-academic recipients, and 17 NSCAA team academic awards.
Cuadrado got his coaching career started at Valparaiso University as an assistant where he also earned his master’s degree in athletic administration. He then spent two years at Illinois State before landing his first head coaching job at North Dakota State. Throughout his time coaching he has been active in the Olympic Development Program (ODP). Cuadrado also has his USSF National “B” Coaching License, National Goalkeeping License and National Youth License.
Cuadrado played college soccer at Northeastern Illinois University for two seasons before transferring to TCU. He was a member of the Horned Frogs soccer program that was ranked as high as No. 8 regionally and earned his bachelor’s degree in marketing in 2000.
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