Coach's Corner: Bill Rychel

The Rise of St. Thomas Football: How Coach Rychel Created a Winning Culture From Scratch

Bill Rychel has already built two football programs from scratch: one at Notre Dame College in Ohio, and now at St. Thomas University in Miami Gardens. But what sets Rychel apart isn’t the wins—it’s how he wins, and more importantly, what he’s building while he does it.

Coach Rychel’s first memory of football wasn’t exactly love at first sight. “I hated it,” he laughs, recalling middle school conditioning as a self-described out-of-shape offensive lineman. But giving up wasn’t allowed in the Rychel household. “We weren’t allowed to quit anything once we started.”

That rule stuck. It’s part of the ethos he now brings into every team meeting, every recruiting pitch, every tough conversation with a student-athlete. Looking back at his seventh-grade season, he’s grateful his parents held the line. “Looking back, part of hating it was not the physical aspect, it was being 13 years old with a bunch of people I had never met, doing something really hard.” That early lesson in perseverance now shapes how he coaches others through adversity.

“We have to coach our athletes to build the mental toughness… any person is going to need to get through a lot harder things in life than winning or losing a game,” Rychel says. When the setbacks get heavier—whether it’s a job loss, a broken relationship, or something else—he wants his players to be ready to persevere.

When Rychel joined St. Thomas in 2018, there was no football team. No players. No history. Just an announcement from university leadership and a blank whiteboard. But he had done this before—and welcomed the challenge.

He saw the blank slate as an opportunity to build not just a roster, but a culture. Together with his staff, he defined a standard that would shape how student-athletes viewed themselves and their responsibility to the larger institution. The way he puts it? “How you do anything is how you do everything.”

The Building Blocks to Grow the Program

Rychel’s program turned a corner quickly. By their second season, the Bobcats posted a winning record, earned multiple All-Conference honors, and celebrated their first All-American. But records aren’t what he leads with. Instead, he talks about mental health, academic support, and preparing athletes to rise after a fall.

When he was named Athletic Director in 2020, the demands on his time multiplied. Rychel leaned into a philosophy built on delegation and trust. “You have great people in place that you can rely on to get certain things done. That’s the only way that it works,” he says.

He doesn’t aim for perfect balance, but instead embraces working in seasons to create harmony. “There are going to be months when my time is fully focused on football—and that’s when I rely on other leaders in the department to step in,” he explains. At other times, his Athletic Director responsibilities take priority, and the pendulum swings the other way, with leaders in the football program stepping up. In this rhythm, Rychel’s dual role naturally creates space for others to lead and grow.

It’s a fluid, grounded approach—and it reflects Rychel’s belief in structure without rigidity, pressure without burnout.

Adapting to the New World of College Athletics

That flexibility is especially important in today’s transfer-heavy landscape. As student-athletes move between programs at historic rates, Rychel takes a more thoughtful approach. “We’ve had really good football players here who’ve had opportunities,” he says. But rather than shutting down the conversation when a player brings up a transfer, he opens a dialogue. He wants to ensure they’ve thought through their future—academically, financially, and athletically—before making a decision.

More than anything, he wants them to think. Not just about the hype of re-entering recruitment, but about the degree, the network, the personal growth they might be giving up. “The biggest thing that no one is talking about in this situation is progress toward a degree,” he says. That kind of mentorship reflects what Rychel sees as the coach’s evolving role—not just trainer or tactician, but translator. Helping 18 to 22 year olds process a world that’s moving faster than ever.

Rychel sees that world clearly. It’s why St. Thomas embedded a full-time mental health counselor within athletics. Incoming athletes now receive mental health screenings alongside their physicals. It’s not an add-on. It’s part of the foundation. And that foundation starts with genuine relationships. Rychel knows he can’t be in every position meeting or group chat, so he hires coaches who lead with care.

“The best coaches with the strongest relationships are often the toughest,” he says. “They demand the most—but they do it the right way, because they’ve built relationships strong enough to support those expectations.”

That duality—candor and care—is what defines Rychel’s leadership style. It’s not always flashy, but it’s deeply effective. His players know where he stands—and, more importantly, who stands behind them. In an era where attention spans are short and commitment is fleeting, Bill Rychel is a throwback. A builder. A connector. A coach who understands that the job isn’t just to win games—but to prepare young people to win in life. And that, more than any scoreboard, may be his greatest legacy.