Ann Murphy, who coaches soccer for FC Jaguars and Lutheran High School, won the 2017 Double-Goal Coach^® Award presented by TeamSnap for her positive impact on youth athletes.

In addition to the coaching roles for which she was nominated for PCA’s award, Murphy is a Kansas City Police Department officer, pursuing a PhD with a dissertation focused on youth mentorship and gang prevention. She also plays for the WPSL’s Kansas City Courage and serves as a staff coach for the KC Courage High School Alternative Soccer Team and as a Staff Coach for Sporting Lee Summit. 

The amount and depth of Murphy’s commitments often have her working a midnight shift for the police department, “sleeping a couple hours,” fulfilling other school and coaching commitments, then working with Jaguars “from 4 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. by the time I take all of them home,” she said. “We have a partnership with the Kansas City Police Athletic League, so they give us a van for out-of-town tournaments, and I use my vacation time to take kids to college showcase tournaments and get them recruited.”

Murphy sees the result of her work with youth as nothing less than “transforming me and the kids,” she said, “for example, knowing a kid who feels safe enough to call on me at two in the morning when he’s sleeping under a bridge because his mom kicked him out of the house. He used to be gang-affiliated and had a 1.5 GPA. Now he has a 3.5 GPA, works full-time for a construction company, and is saving up to go to community college so he can be a business major and start his own construction company.”

IT IS CLEAR THAT ANN MURPHY TRANSFORMS THE LIVES OF HER STUDENT-ATHLETES. NORMALLY, COACHES AREN'T RECOGNIZED FOR THIS FOCUS, BUT WE URGE YOU TO CONSIDER NOMINATING COACHES YOU KNOW LIKE ANN.

NOMINATE NOW