Sigi Schmid

Sigi Schmid

Siegfried “Sigi” Schmid was a German-American soccer coach. He coached the UCLA Bruins from 1980 to 1999. Schmid also coached the Los Angeles Galaxy and the Columbus Crew in MLS. He was the recipient of the MLS Coach of the Year Award in 1999 and 2008. He died on December 25, 2018, weeks after being hospitalized in Los Angeles with a heart-related condition.

About Sigi Schmid in brief

Summary Sigi SchmidSiegfried “Sigi” Schmid was a German-American soccer coach. He coached the UCLA Bruins from 1980 to 1999. Schmid also coached the Los Angeles Galaxy and the Columbus Crew in MLS. He was the recipient of the MLS Coach of the Year Award in 1999 and 2008. In 2009, he was hired by the expansion Seattle Sounders as their first head coach. In 2016, he left the club on mutual terms and was replaced by Brian Schmetzer. He died on December 25, 2018, weeks after being hospitalized in Los Angeles with a heart-related condition. He played college soccer from 1972 to 1975 at the University of California, Los Angeles. He also played for one of the inaugural American Youth Soccer Organization teams. His family moved from Tübingen, West Germany, to Torrance, California, in 1962. He had a stuttering speech disorder he did not overcome until high school. He worked as a Certified Public Accountant before coaching full-time. He and his wife had four children. He is survived by his wife and four children, all of whom were born in the U.S. and one of whom was adopted by the German government as a child. He has a son and a daughter with ex-wife, both of whom are also soccer coaches. He won the MLS Cup with Columbus in 2008, and was inducted into the AYSO Hall of Fame in 1996. In 2014, Schmid led the Sounders to seven playoff appearances, four Lamar Hunt U. S. Open Cup titles, and an MLS Supporters’ Shield in 2014. His defensive tactics were also highly regarded in the press and often cited as a factor in his success.

His final two seasons with Los Angeles led directly to the termination of his contract. He resigned from the position in September 2018 and was replacing by assistant coach Dominic Kinnear. He received his Bachelor of Economics degree in 1976 before earning a Master of Business Administration degree in 1984. His first coaching experience was in 1975 for Bishop Montgomery High School in Bishop Montgomery, California. In 1980, he coached a small club called the South Bay Vikings. In 1984, he won the NCAA Division I championship by defeating American University 1–0 after eight overtime periods. He began focusing solely on coaching in 1984 and began focusing on solely focusing on soccer. In 1986, he became the head coach at UCLA. He led the Bruins to a record of 322–63–33 during that period, leading the team to a national championship in 1985, 1990, and 1997. In 1998, he took over as head coach after Gay Gay left the position. He retired from UCLA in 1999. He later worked as an analyst for ESPN as a studio analyst and was named the head Coach of Los Angeles once again in 2017, replacing Curt Onalfo. In 2010, he moved to ESPN to become an analyst and coach the LA Galaxy. He spent the last three years of his coaching career in the studio analyst role at ESPN. In 2012, he retired from ESPN as an Analyst.