Janet Nuzman
Coached Gymnastics 1963-68
Coached Field Hockey 1968-70
Coached Women’s Basketball 1969-70
Coached Softball 1970-71
Coached Volleyball 1969-81
Coordinator of Women’s Athletics 1979-82
Inducted 1988-89
Janet Nuzman can be credited with kick-starting the entire women’s athletics program at Washburn. During her time as a faculty member and administrator at Washburn she started and coached five women’s sports and in 1988-89 she was inducted into the Washburn Athletic Hall of Fame.
When Nuzman became a faculty member in 1962 athletic opportunities for women consisted of yearly activities with area schools called sports days or play days. The following year she organized a gymnastics team that competed with schools from Kansas and neighboring states. She coached that team from 1963-68.
After that she began a field hockey and women’s basketball team in 1968 and the following year she started volleyball and softball. She did all of this while teaching at WU fulltime and without receiving additional pay.
Nuzman had a 143-208 record in 13 seasons as the volleyball coach, her longest tenure with any of the teams she started. She helped the Lady Blues to a Kansas Association of Intercollegiate Athletics for Women championship in 1978 and again in 1981, her final year.
In the first two years of the softball team’s existence she had a 3-7 record and in the basketball team’s inaugural year she went 0-5.
Nuzman served as coordinator for women’s athletics at WU from 1979-82 and after that she returned to teaching full time. She also served as president of the Kansas Association of Intercollegiate Athletics for Women.
Billie Jean Moore, WU Hall of Fame member and former UCLA and Olympic coach praised Nuzman’s contributions to women’s athletics at Washburn. “My high school and college coach, Jan Nuzman, was my role model professionally and as an individual. She pointed me in the direction I’ve gone.”
