'Rudy', 26, moves from Georgetown to coach M. Soccer

Ending nearly two months of searching, the Athletic Department yesterday tapped Georgetown assistant coach Brian Fuller to be seventh men's soccer coach in Penn's history. "Rudy" as Fuller prefers to be called, will begin immediately but will be shuttling between his new office at Penn and his old one at Georgetown for the next two weeks in order to close out his nine-year career at Georgetown. Before becoming an assistant coach in 1993, Fuller played the previous four seasons on the Hoyas varsity team. Women's soccer coach and selection committee member Patrick Baker said last week that he expected the new coach would have held at least a head coaching job at the Division III level prior to coming to Penn. Fuller, who is 26 years old, has never held a head coaching position at the college level. To his credit, Fuller was the head coach of the Maryland Olympic Development Program for the past three years and was named a staff coach to the Region I ODP this past summer. "I felt good about the interviews and the process, and I felt good about what I presented to the committee," Fuller said. "I think over the past five years I gained a lot of insight and experience at Georgetown putting together a program that has become very successful and well known nationally." While Fuller's resume does not appear to fit with what the search committee had expressed as far as previous experience requirements, his plan for the future impressed current team members and made them excited about his hiring. "What we really like about him was his vision to make it a complete program," Brown said. "He brought in a packet of information that was really well organized. His vision was to look at more than just the soccer field. It was an outline of his coaching style and his goals for the program, and when he presented it, it surprised us and we thought it was a pretty good idea." Fuller also meets the search committee's intention to find someone capable of recruiting athletes who fit the academic requirements of the school. Fuller said Georgetown is very similar to Penn in its desire to recruit high caliber students and in its decision not to offer athletic scholarships in the soccer program. The Athletic Department would no doubt be thrilled if Fuller can bring the national success he helped build at Georgetown with him to a Penn program which suffered a disappointing 4-12-1 season. Georgetown reached the NCAA Final 16 last season. "Their success the past five years has been outstanding for any program, especially a non-scholarship program," Brown said. In order to have similar success at Penn as he did while at Georgetown, Fuller's first job will be to try and salvage this year's recruiting process, which was badly disrupted by the search for a new coach. Fuller said he was directly contacted by the Athletic Department during their search in mid-December, although he also submitted a resume and cover letter into the regular applicant pool. His first meeting with the search committee was shortly before Christmas, and he returned in early January for a final interview and a meeting with player representatives Mike O' Connor and Reggie Brown. Fuller was officially announced as the coach today after agreeing to a contract. Fuller would not disclose the length of the contract, but said that it was for more than one year and it would allow him time to build his vision for the Quakers program. He will be on campus Sunday to meet with the whole soccer team for the first time.

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