Four-time Horizon League Coach of the Year Jake Reilly enters his 11th season as a member of the coaching staff at his alma mater in 2024-25.
Reilly was selected as the women’s cross country coach of the year in 2018, 2020, 2021, and 2022, winning the Horizon League Championship in each of those four seasons, the first four women’s cross country titles in the program’s Division I history.
During the women’s team’s four-championships in six-years, Reilly has coached 14 All-Conference selections, and has led a total of 24 All-Conference honorees in women’s cross country. Meanwhile he has also led 15 men’s runners to all-conference accolades in cross country since taking the lead in 2013.
In recent years, Reilly has helped several Panthers re-write the record book led by Meg Swietlik and Trevor Wenzel. Swietlik owns Milwaukee’s top-time in 6K cross country races, and is second among Panther runners in 5K events, while Wenzel set the top times in both 8K and 10K races during his final season in 2022.
Following the team’s second consecutive championship in 2021, Milwaukee appeared in the U.S. Track & Field Cross Country Coaches Association Rankings for the first time in program history.
Beyond the Horizon League Championships, Reilly has helped lead 15 males and 11 females to top-100 finishes at the NCAA Regional Championship meets. Swietlik has been the top female finisher under Reilly’s watch with a 24th place finish in 2019, while Wenzel (2022) and Corey Thornton (2019) took 46th position in their best finishes at the regional meet.
During the 2020 season, which was contested in the spring of 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Swietlik became the first Panther to win an individual cross country championship since 2015 and also qualified for the NCAA Championship meet, becoming the second Panther in program history to reach the national event.
In 2019, the men’s program also earned regional notoriety, when the team reached regional rankings for the second consecutive season at the 14th position following a push from Thornton, who was a multi-time first-team selection in the Horizon League.
In his first year overseeing the program in 2018-19, Reilly earned his first Horizon League Coach of the Year recognition after winning the women’s cross country team championship led by individual runner-up Mikayla Fox. During the 2018 Horizon League Championships, the men’s team took second in the final standing, as the team was regionally ranked for the first time since 2015.
Away from the cross country course, Reilly has also been an integral part in the success of the distance programs during the winter and spring seasons with the track & field programs since joining the coaching staff in 2014. His stint with the track & field program was Emily Royston qualifying for the NCAA West Regional in the 10,000-meter run at the end of the 2019 outdoor season. Royston became the first Panther to qualify for a distance event greater than 1,500-meters since the 2009 campaign.
In total, Reilly has led seven individuals to eight Horizon League individual distance championships including Dana Clausen, who swept the 800m run during both the indoor and outdoor championships in 2015.
Reilly has also coached several student-athletes into the top-five of the record books in program history; including Lauren Peters in during the indoor 800m, Leah Holmes in the indoor mile, Fox in the indoor 3,000m, Swietlik and Fox in the indoor 5,000m. Terry McMillan, and Caleb Abfall own the top two spots in the men’s indoor mile, while Marcus Paulson and Wenzel are in the 3,000m indoor race, while Wenzel and Noah Tagliapietra own top-five spots in the men’s indoor 5,000m run.
In the outdoor record book, Reilly has also guided his athletes into the top-five all-time at Milwaukee including Peters and Clausen in the 800m, Megan Safranski in the 1,500m, Royston and Fox in the 10,000m, and Cailin Kinas and Alayna Franson in the 3,000m steeplechase. On the men’s outdoor track side, Reilly has led Wenzel into the top spot in the 5,000m and 10,000m run, while Wenzel is also in the top-five in the 1,500m. Paulson joins both Wenzel on the 1,500m and 5,000m lists, with Ian Nadolski in the top-five on the 10,000m run list. Abfall, McMillan, and Aidan Sodemann all own top-five marks in the 3,000m steeplechase on the men’s side.
Reilly had a stellar running career at Milwaukee. In cross country, he scored at the league meet all four years, highlighted by a pair of first-team all-league finishes (fourth place as a junior, third as a senior). He also had a standout career on the track, taking second-team all-league honors in the outdoor 5000m as a junior.
In all, Reilly scored at the league meet nine times in track across three different events (1500m, 3000m and 5k). He graduated with his name on five all-time top-10 performance lists in program history, including being part of the school record in the outdoor DMR and second all-time in the outdoor 5000m.
Reilly serves his country as a member of the United State Marine Corps Reserves.
