Matt Helsel was named the head coach of the women's tennis program at Elizabethtown College in the spring of 2002, and he has turned the Blue Jays into one of the top teams in the South Atlantic Region. He’s currently in his 11th season as head women's coach in 2012-13 and has led the Blue Jays to three straight Commonwealth Conference Championships.
Helsel is the most succssful coach in Elizabethtown College women's tennis history with 128 career victories. He has transformed a team that was in mired in a six-year stretch without a postseason appearance into the premier squad in the Commonwealth Conference.
Helsel, an Elizabethtown College alum, owns a 128-42 career record, including six Commonwealth Conference Championships and each of the last three.
The Blue Jays have been regulars in the Intercollegiate Tennis Association's (ITA) regional rankings since the spring of 2004.
A consistently strong lineup has delieved the Jays no less than 10 wins in each of the last eight seasons. In 2011-12, the women set a new program standard with 18 wins and claimed the first ever NCAA Tournament victory for the program, 5-2, over Endicott (Mass.).
Helsel and E-town's eight-year run of dominance began with a perfect 14-0 season in 2004. It was the women's tennis program's first unbeaten season since 1977 and fifth all-time.
In the spring of 2010 the Jays completed a 15-5 season under Helsel’s leadership, which included the program’s fourth Commonwealth Conference Championship. The team advanced to the NCAA Division III Tournament and its victory over Lebanon Valley in the Commonwealth Conference finals was the 350th in team history.
Elizabethtown won back-to-back Commonwealth Conference team titles in the fall of 2004 and 2005. The 2006-07 team's 17-3 overall record stood as the winningest season in team history until this past spring, while the 2007-08 Blue Jays won the Commonwealth Conference title and advanced to the NCAA Division III Tournament for the first time.
In addition to coaching the men's and women's tennis teams at E-town, Helsel is a local real estate agent with Selections Real Estate in Lancaster.
A 1991 graduate of Lampeter-Strasburg High School, he returned to his alma mater as head tennis coach for four years. He was an English and political science double major at Millersville University from 1992 to 1994, and earned a bachelor of arts degree in business administration from Elizabethtown in 2007.
