Ellie Johnson returned to her alma mater as head coach of the Concordia University Irvine men’s and women’s tennis teams in December 2023.
Currently in her second season at CUI, both tennis teams are coming off Top 5 finishes at the PacWest Tournament and just posted the most wins in program history during the NCAA DII Era.
Johnson helped the CUI women make the NCAA DII West Regional for the third time in four years. Led by
ITA All-Americans Sophie Rachor and senior Tiffany Carrillo, the Golden Eagles went 16-7 overall. Rachor and PacWest Freshman of the Year Emilie Lugon-Moulin each won 17 singles matches, placing them Top 10 all-time in that category and helping them both achieve First Team All-PacWest accolades.
Lugon-Moulin was also named ITA West Regional Rookie of the Year.
On the men's side, Mattis Le Montagner and Mario Aleksic were named All-Conference selections as CUI also notched a program record for the DII era with 13 wins. Along with Spencer Cinco, Le Montagner won 16 matches in singles to vault into the Top 10 in record books.
A former CUI tennis student-athlete and head coach at Westmont College, Johnson earned her bachelor's degree in exercise sports science from Concordia in 2015. As a senior, she helped Concordia win the GSAC title, competing primarily at No. 2 singles and No. 1 doubles. She then completed her master's degree in the MCAA program (Master's of Coaching and Athletic Administration) and worked as a tennis graduate assistant with former CUI head coach Jonathan Sanchez.
In addition to spending nearly six years coaching at
Westmont, Johnson was the GSAC Coach of the Year after the 2018 and 2019 seasons. She also won multiple coaching awards from the International Tennis Association (ITA) during her time in Santa Barbara.
She has stayed connected to her
alma mater in recent years by serving as an adjunct professor at Concordia since 2019. She has focused her teaching on topics ranging from nutritional science, to health and wellness programming and principles of coaching.
Johnson still ranks in the top ten all-time with 33 career wins in singles play in the CUI record books. She was also a NAIA Scholar-Athlete and
GSAC Scholar-Athlete in back-to-back seasons before graduating in 2015.
Johnson lives in Orange County and is excited to continue bridging the gap between Concordia tennis alumni, our current student-athletes and the next generation of Golden Eagles.
