LIGHT DUTY: Matt Smith, holding trophies, celebrates a successful performance by the Princeton University men’s rowing team at the Henley Royal Regatta in England. Smith, who had served as an assistant coach for the Tiger men’s heavyweights from 2014, was recently named as the head coach of the Princeton University men’s lightweight program. (Photo by Row2K, provided courtesy of Princeton Athletics)
By Bill Alden
From 2005-06, Matt Smith was stationed in the Middle East with the U.S. Army, leading a military transition team training Iraqi soldiers.
“I was on a 10-man team of Americans, we had three interpreters and we were embedded into a 400-person Iraqi unit for the year,” said Smith. “We lived with our Iraqi counterparts for the year and did everything through interpreters. To me it was very exciting. I was the planner, I was the operations guy so I coordinated the 100-plus combat missions that we ran. The takeaway for me was that all 10 of us Americans came home.”
This summer, Smith, 47, a former University of Wisconsin rowing star and Olympian who was part of the Army’s World Class Athlete program before his stint in Iraq, has embarked on a new mission as he was named as the new head coach of the Princeton University men’s lightweight rowing team.
For Smith, who started his coaching career at Cornell in 2008 before coming to Princeton in 2014 as an assistant coach for the Tiger men’s heavyweight program, his military experience was good preparation for his current role.
“What I loved about the military is that you are around young men at a pivotal time in their life, it is very much what coaching is,” said Smith, who rose to the rank of captain in the Army and earned a Bronze Star and Meritorious Service Medal for exceptional duty in combat and peacetime operations. “I had a pivotal college career and an amazing coach who did teach me a lot. I always had an inkling that would be an interesting thing that I would like to try.”
Growing up in Northern Virginia, Smith fell in love with rowing when he joined the Woodbridge High crew team. Even though he didn’t enjoy a lot of success during his high school career, he decided that he wanted to row at the next level.
“We were not good, I have said that numerous, numerous times,” said Smith. “We lost a lot of races by a lot of big margins. But what it taught me was I just liked rowing. I liked the sport so when I finally decided in October of my senior year that I wanted to try to row in college that really shifted the schools I was looking at.”
Smith ended up shifting his focus to Wisconsin where he got accepted and went there on an Army ROTC scholarship. He had reached out to the Wisconsin coach and was encouraged to join the program.
“I grew very, very much; I had one coach during my four years there, Chris Clark,” said Smith. “He was the freshman coach and then he became the varsity coach. He literally coached me for four years. I was very lucky, he created opportunities for me. He saw my potential as a 165-pound kid and said you should try to go to these elite camps during the summer. Freshman year, he said go out to this U.S. U-23 lightweight camp that we are running in Indiana. Even if I am going to get cut, it is go and try it out and I did and I made the under-23 team.”
Getting invited to try out for the U.S. senior national team in 1998, Smith crossed paths with Greg Hughes, his future boss at Princeton.
“Greg took me under his wing, he taught me how to row a small boat here on Lake Carnegie and took care of me as just a young pup,” said Smith. “In the summer of ’99 after my junior year of college, he had changed roles and was a national team coach in addition to coaching the freshmen here at Princeton. I was in a selection pool and ended up coming out on that side of things, making the lightweight pair. He was my coach that summer.”
Hughes made an immediate connection with Smith. “It was great; he was an incredible teammate and a fun guy to row with,” said Hughes. “Mike Teti (a former Princeton coach) paired us together. He was the young up-and-comer and I was the old man.”
After graduating from Wisconsin in 2000, Smith was commissioned into the military as an infantry officer and completed the infantry program, including Ranger and Airborne training, over the next year.
“I went through all of those things and completed all of that and then in that process I had applied to get into the Army World Class Athlete Program,” said Smith. “Because I had made the senior national team already, it was hey you are qualified. It is a great program that the military still has.”
In training through that program, Smith returned to Princeton.
“From 2002 to 2004, my job was to make the Olympic team,” said Smith. “For lack of a better word, I was stationed here in Princeton, it was as close as you are ever going to be to being a professional athlete. It was amazing, I was very lucky. I was living in Princeton, I rowed with the lightweight national team for the summers of ’02, ’03 and ’04 which was great. I rowed in the lightweight eight at first and then in the lightweight four in 2003 and 2004.”
Smith accomplished that mission, competing in the 2004 Athens Olympics.
“It was amazing, it was awesome, it is the Olympics,” said Smith in reflecting on his Athens experience. “We ended up ninth. You can always sit there and say I wish that had gone better but it was an awesome, awesome thing. The fact that I was able to represent the military was really cool.”
After Olympics, Smith did military management training before getting sent to Iraq. Upon returning from Iraq, Smith resumed training with the World Class Athlete Program and competed in the Pan American Games and the World Championships. An injury derailed his bid to make the 2008 Olympics, leading to his transition to coaching.
Moving to Ithaca, N.Y, with his wife, Hilary Gehman, a two-time Olympic rower who was coaching at Cornell, Smith got his first taste of coaching.
“There was a coaching change going on up there and I was suggested to apply for a job,” said Smith. “I applied and became the freshman coach at Cornell in the fall of 2008. It was great, I loved it. It was a great group of people up there. I was there for six year before Greg called me and asked me to come here to Princeton.”
For Hughes, bringing in Smith to his program was a no-brainer.
“When the position opened up, I was very eager to get him to Princeton,” said Hughes, noting that Smith had honed his skills by coaching in U.S U-23 rowing program while at Cornell. “I knew his character, values and work ethic. This is a guy we really wanted to have at the boathouse.”
Working with Hughes over the last 11 years has helped Smith evolve as a coach.
“It was awesome, it wasn’t a boss-assistant relationship, our friendship has grown immensely,” said Smith. “I learned a ton. We created an environment here where, as he would say, we are co-coaches. Our goal is to make this team go as fast as possible. We are going to come at it in as many ways as possible, wanting to kick the can on so many ideas. and try different things. I have been very lucky over the past 11 years here at the boathouse. Just through osmosis, I have learned a lot of information.”
Over the years, Smith has developed great relationships in and out of the boathouse.
“I didn’t go to Princeton, I am not from New Jersey, but we have truly grown to love this place,” said Smith. “This place being the Princeton boathouse, Princeton University and the Princeton community. If you had asked me that 11 years ago, I would not have said that.”
In taking the helm of the men’s lightweight program, Smith is looking to help his rowers love Princeton as well.
“You see that it still comes down to people and relationships,” said Smith. “We are all very, very competitive. We all want to win but I think we all want the athletes that are here to have an amazing Princeton experience and not let their happiness be solely dictated by a certain result in a certain boat. Yes those things matter but they can’t judge and only be solely happy by a medal around your neck. I think we do a very good job of getting medals around necks. That is more the end result of what we do day-to-day and the culture we are developing here in the boathouse.”
While Smith is determined to create that positive culture, he is also focused on winning medals.
“Me taking on this role and being hired in this position, it wasn’t about my ego, needing to be a head coach,” said Smith. “For me I look at it, as my skill set and knowledge and things I do is going to make Princeton lightweight men better and make the Princeton boathouse better. I really enjoy coming to work, it is a fun, fun group but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t challenges and stressful moments.”
As Smith has immersed himself in his new role, he believes his athletes share that mindset as they look to improve on a 2025 campaign that saw the varsity eight finish third in the Eastern Sprints and fifth at the Intercollegiate Rowing Association (IRA) National Championship regatta.
“The main message is that is sounds like they are a hungry team, they are excited to get to work,” said Smith. “We are going to try some new things. We might get some things right, we might get some things wrong. I was very lucky because I am walking into a great set-up. What is going on right now is a lot of one-on-one meetings with the guys to see where they want to take the the team, what are their goals, and what are the things they feel we can improve upon.”
Smith is leaning on the team’s seniors to lead the way in that process.
“We have 16 seniors, which is a very large group, and those guys are chomping at the bit,” said Smith. “The current seniors are the group of individuals that won the varsity eight and the second eight at the national championships and Eastern Sprints. I want to help them leave their legacy. They are like we had this great first year and maybe we have had some little bumps in the road the past two years. We want to get back to where we were and do it our way. Let’s figure out what our strengths are and maximize those strengths and leave on a high note.”
In the view of Hughes, Smith is well-suited to achieve that mission.
“Number one he is a student of the sport; he is a level three certified coach and has continued to develop his coaching skill set,” said Hughes, a former Princeton lightweight star and head coach. “He knows almost every coach in the country and is constantly talking with folks and trying to figure out new ways to solve problems. I think that is going be a huge value. As rowing evolves, he is going to remain at the forefront of it. He is not going to rely on things he has done in the past. Number two is his ability to create hard working environments. Guys can come in and they are going to work hard and have fun doing it. That is at the core of Princeton lightweight rowing. That is what we like to do. We like to go fast and have fun. He will do a good job of that.”
Smith, for his part, is ready to push his rowers to work hard and smart.
“One of our goals is let’s make sure that we are training and learning how to perform under pressure and that we are constantly improving on who we are,” said Smith. “We are not saying, ‘OK, this is good enough.’ We want to raise the standards. As we have seen in the lightweight men’s league and the heavyweight men’s league, it is at an all-time high right now. Collegiate rowing right now is off the charts.”
With his military experience, Smith can certainly teach his rowers a lot about performing under pressure.