Mark Lucas Named Interim Head Coach For Volleyball

Wells College has announced that Mark Lucas will serve as interim head coach for the women’s and men’s volleyball teams for the 2016-17 academic year. He has been promoted to this role after serving as an assistant coach with the Express women’s volleyball team for the last two seasons and the men’s volleyball team over the last three seasons.

Lucas succeeds former volleyball head coach Richard Gary, who led the creation of the men’s volleyball program at Wells for the 2012 season and the re-launch of women’s volleyball at the institution in the fall of 2012. Gary coached the men’s program for five seasons and the women’s team for four seasons and was hired in the summer of 2016 as head coach for the men’s volleyball team at Vassar College.

Lucas was a part of significantly improving the women's volleyball team during his first season in 2014 when the Express posted the conference's most dramatic improvement in overall and conference record. After a 5-25 record in 2013, the team's second season as a modern-era varsity program, Wells improved to a 23-11 overall record alongside a 10-2 mark within the conference to qualify for the postseason for the first time in 2014. Success continued in the 2015 season with an 18-11 overall record and 11-1 record in the North Eastern Athletic Conference.

Over the past two seasons, the women's volleyball team has had six All-NEAC selections including 2014 NEAC Rookie of the Year and 2015 NEAC Defensive Player of the Year Anuhea Leite-Ah Yo.

In his three seasons working with the men's volleyball program at Wells, the team has totaled eight All-NEAC selections including the 2014 Rookie of the Year. The 2014 season saw Wells lead the NCAA Division III men's volleyball statistical ranking in service aces per set. In 2015, Wells qualified for the NEAC postseason tournament for the first time in program history.

Lucas comes to Aurora after serving as the head coach of the men’s volleyball program at Kyoto University of Foreign Studies in Kyoto, Japan. Across a nine-year career as bench boss in Japan, Lucas compiled an overall coaching record of 73-65 (.529 winning percentage) and posted the best fall (7-1) and spring (7-0) seasons in program history in 2006. He played for the Matsugasaki Club Team in Kyoto dating back to April of 2008, winning the Sakyo-ku League Championship twice.

Lucas has held volunteer assistant coaching positions with boys and girls high school volleyball teams in the Rochester and Syracuse areas.

Outside of volleyball, Lucas currently serves as an ESL Instructor at Wells College and has also taught classes at Tompkins-Cortland Community College and Tompkins-Seneca-Tioga BOCES. He is an editor for the Paleontological Research Institution in Ithaca, N.Y. Lucas is a tutor for graduate-school candidates preparing for the GRE and GMAT. He served as a full-time English Lecturer at Kansai University, Kyoto University of Foreign Studies and the Doshisha Women's College of Liberal Arts.

Lucas possesses two bachelor's degrees, the first in Biomedical Computing from the Rochester Institute of Technology and the second from SUNY Brockport in Theatre (Acting/Dance). Lucas earned his master’s degree from SUNY Brockport in Secondary Science Education (Physics).

He resides in Ithaca with his wife Kathy and his dogs Cora and Harper.