The 2025-26 season marks the 25th for Kathy Nortz Yohann as cross country and track coach at Case Western Reserve. She has led the Spartan cross country teams for the past 24 years and served as an assistant for the track & field program for 18.
The longest-tenured female coach at the university, Nortz Yohann was appointed for her second stint at CWRU on June 5, 2001. Until 2006, she also served as head coach for the women’s track & field team.
Nortz Yohann has coached eight cross country athletes to 13 All-America honors during her time with the team, most recently Lauren Iagnemma, who placed 18th at the 2023 NCAA Championships and 36th at the 2024 national championship. She also mentored multiple-time cross country All-Americans Esther Erb (2006 and 2007), Justine Jeroski (2008, 2009, and 2010) on the women's side, and Sam Merriman (2016 and 2017) on the men's side. CWRU cross country has been represented by at least one men's or women's team member at the NCAA Championship for 21 consecutive seasons.
In 2024, Nortz Yohann was presented with the Marv Frye Award for distinguished service for the sport of cross country in the state of Ohio, becoming the first woman ever to win the award.
Her work with the distance unit during the indoor and outdoor track & field seasons has produced an additional five All-America honors, including the 2023 men's indoor distance medley relay (the first All-America relay in team history) and four from Erb.
She guided Erb to the 2008 NCAA Championship in the women’s 10,000-meter run and has led multiple distance runners and relay teams to school record-breaking performances. In addition, four of Nortz Yohann’s cross country runners have received NCAA Postgraduate Scholarships, and one was a finalist for the NCAA Woman of the Year award in addition to receiving the Fulbright Scholarship in Vienna, Australia.
During her career, Nortz Yohann has earned a multitude of Coach of the Year awards. She has been tabbed Ohio Track and Cross Country Coaches Association Coach of the Year seven times (most recently in 2013), USTFCCCA Great Lakes Region Coach of the Year once (2006), and head of the UAA Women’s Cross Country Coaching Staff of the Year twice (2006 and 2008).
Under Nortz Yohann’s tutelage, CWRU cross country has also been represented at the NCAA Championship Meet in each season since 2006. That streak includes five consecutive qualifying years for the women’s team from 2006 to 2010. During that stretch, the Spartan women finished in the top 10 twice, including in 2007, when the team finished sixth in the nation – one of the highest national finishes for any Spartan athletic team in school history. In 2008, both the men’s and women’s squads ran at the NCAA Championship, marking the first time that the two competed concurrently at that meet.
More recently, the men's team reached the NCAA Cross Country Championships for four consecutive years from 2018-22, the second-longest stretch in the program's history.
Nortz Yohann first came to CWRU in 1990 when she was named the head women's cross country coach and assistant track & field coach. She left the university briefly in 1993 to pursue a position in sports medicine, but she quickly returned to the coaching ranks as women’s cross country and track & field head coach at Cleveland State University from 1994-96. Nortz Yohann moved on to serve in the same capacity at John Carroll University from 1996 to 2001.
In addition to coaching, Nortz Yohann has served as a member of the Behavioral Health Committee and has served on the Women’s Leadership Council at the university level. She also served as the President on a national level for the USTFCCCA for Division III Cross Country and is active in speaking on mental training tools for athletes and coaches. She has held the positions of President of the Ohio Track and Cross Country Coaches and Vice President of the USTFCCCA. Nortz Yohann, a 2010 graduate of the NCAA Women’s Coaches Academy, also attends the USTFCCCA Women's Coaching Summits yearly.
A graduate of Ohio University, Lanese Yohann was a scholarship athlete who competed in middle-distance and distance events. She was a member of a Bobcat track team that won two consecutive Mid-American Conference Championships (1983-84) and the All-Ohio Cross Country Championship in 1982. Individually, Nortz Yohann finished 11th and 14th, respectively, at the MAC Championship and was a member of the record-setting 3,200-meter relay and distance medley relay teams. During her senior year, Nortz Yohann was named captain of both the track and cross country teams. She was voted the team's most improved runner in 1985 and also set a Bobcat indoor record in the 1,500-meter run that still stands today.
Nortz Yohann received her Bachelor of Science in Foods and Nutrition from Ohio University and both her certification in athletic training and her graduate studies in exercise science from Cleveland State.
Nortz Yohann resides in Lakewood and has two children, Evan and Kasey. Evan is a graduate of CWRU.
Nortz Yohann Highlights
- 18 NCAA All-Americans (cross country and track)
- 2008 NCAA Champion Esther Erb (10k)
- Two NCAA Elite 90 Winners - Sam Merriman (2016 cross country) & Jack Begley (2022 cross country)
- Four NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship winners
- 2006 & 2008 UAA Women’s Cross Country Champions
- 2024 Marv Frye Award Winner for distinguished service for the sport of cross country in Ohio; The first woman ever to win the award
- 2006 USTFCCCA Great Lakes Region Coach of the Year
- 2006 & 2008 UAA Women’s Cross Country Coaching Staff of the Year
- Seven-time Ohio Track and Cross Country Coaches Association Coach of the Year
- 2007 NCAA Women's Cross Country Championship – sixth place
Updated August 2025
