Tom Stone joins the Clemson Women’s Soccer Staff

July 12, 2006

CLEMSON, SC–Tom Stone, a former Head Coach in the Women’s United Soccer Association (WUSA) and a television analyst has join the Clemson Women’s Soccer Staff as announced by Head Clemson Women’s Head Soccer Coach Todd Bramble Wednesday afternoon.

Stone was the Head Coach of the Atlanta Beat of the WUSA for the three years of its existence in 2001-2003.

During his career with the Atlanta Beat, he was the first coach hired in the professional league. He led the 2001 team to the Inaugural Regular Season WUSA Championship. He had the best winning pct. of any coach in the WUSA. He had the most wins, least losses and finished 13 games over .500 during his career with the WUSA. He was selected as the WUSA All-Star Game Coach in 2001 and 2003. The Beat was the only team to qualify for the playoffs for all three years. In 2001, and 2003, Stone led his team to the Founders Cup. For the three seasons, his teams had the best overall defensive stats all time, and had the third best overall team offensive stats.

“I am excited to join the Clemson program and for the opportunity to work with a national caliber program,” said Stone. “I am looking forward to working with Todd and joining the Clemson community.”

Recently, Stone has been working as the Technical Director of the TopHat Soccer Club in Atlanta, GA since January, 2004. TopHat is one of the top girls youth soccer clubs in the south region. He was involved in all areas of club/team/player development including training curriculums and the College Prep Program that prepares the top players for college soccer opportunities. He was also the head coach of the Tophat 07 Gold Team that won the Georgia State Championship in 2004 and the Regional Premier League in 2005.

“We are very fortunate to have attracted a coach of Tom’s caliber and reputation,” said Bramble. “Myself, along with the players and staff are eager to learn from the experiences he had while coaching in the best league in the world. He will immediately be given a tremendous amount of responsibility in training, game day coaching and recruiting. We are happy to welcome Tom and his wife Lindsey to the Clemson family.”

Prior to his professional coaching career, he was the Girls Founding Director of Coaching at the Colorado Rush Soccer Club in Denver Colorado from 1991-2000. During his tenure, his program had one of the most successful runs in youth soccer history as Rush won 35 state cups, 12 regional Championships, and 8 National Championships. He was the first coach and club to win U17, U20, and Women’s Amateur National Championships in the same year. Stone has coached over 150 players that have signed into Division I college soccer programs.

On the college level, he was a Volunteer Assistant coach at Duke in 1997, and was a part time assistant coach at the University of Denver in 1996.

Stone has done extensive work with various television networks. He is the lead Soccer Analyst for College Sports Television, and is the lead Soccer Analyst for Fox Sports ACC coverage. He was the Soccer Analyst for ESPN’s 2003 Women’s World Cup coverage. He is also a guest columnist for various soccer web sites. Stone played college soccer at Duke in the 1984-1987 seasons. In 1986, the Blue Devils won the National Championship and Stone scored the game winner in the 1-0 win over the Akron Zips. He was named All-ACC three times was the team captain in 1987. He set the record for most NCAA Tournament goals, and game winners for a single season. He earned a BA in History from Duke in 1988.

After his college career, he played professionally for the Le Havre FC in France the Washington Stars, and the Colorado Foxes. He was a three-year member of the U.S. Youth National Team and was a two-time Parade All-America at MacArthur High School in Irving Texas.