University of Guelph Athletics

Hometown: Surrey, B.C.
Position: Head Coach, University of Guelph Gryphons Women's Volleyball
Experience: 20th season (2005-06 to present)
Alma Mater: University of Winnipeg, 2001 
 
The 2024-25 season will mark Paul Funk's 20th season as head coach of the University of Guelph women's volleyball program. 
 
During his head coaching tenure with the Gryphons, Coach Funk has been named "OUA West Coach of the Year" on three separate occasions (2013-14, 2016-17, 2017-18). For the last 11 years, Coach Funk has been involved as a head coach for the OVA’s High Performance Center during the summer and served as the Team Ontario head coach in 2011. Prior to coming to Guelph, he coached Orebro Volley of the Swedish Elitserien, where he led the club to three consecutive Swedish championships (SM-Guld) from 2002-05 and an overall record of 78-7 in his three seasons. While in Orebro, his club competed twice in the European Top Teams Cup and once in the CEV Cup, compiling an overall record of 4-5, including matches versus club teams from Russia, Latvia, Bosnia, Belgium, Romania, Denmark, the Netherlands, and Poland. In 2002, he was an instructor at the Swedish national sport school RIG Falkoping where he was involved with the Swedish Junior national team program that competed in European Championship qualifications in Chateauroux, France.
 
Coach Funk has also been involved with the Team Canada women’s national team programs at various levels since 1999, including the 1999 Pan-Am Games in Winnipeg, 2 NORCECA Championships (Bronze and Silver medals), 2 Olympic qualifying tournaments for Sydney 2000, 2 Montreux Volleymasters tournaments (Montreux, Switzerland), 1 FISU World University Games (Mallorca, Spain 1999), 1 Pan-American Cup tournament, and various tours of Japan, Germany, Switzerland, Spain, and Italy. He continues to be a regular guest coach at various National team selection camps.  
 
At the U SPORTS level, Coach Funk was an assistant coach at the University of Winnipeg from 2000-2001, and at UBC from 1994-1999 where the team competed in the national championships finishing 5th (once), 4th (once), as well as reaching the U SPORTS podium as bronze medalists (once) and silver medalists (twice). As an assistant, he has also won a BCCAA Provincial Championship as well as a CCAA National Silver medal with Douglas College in 1995.
 
Coach Funk started his coaching career in 1988 in his hometown of Surrey, B.C. where he coached his former high school team (Queen Elizabeth Senior Secondary) in two B.C. High School Boys Championship appearances finishing with one 7th-place finish and one bronze medal.
 
As a player, Coach Funk won a BCCAA championship with Douglas College in 1986 including being named playoff MVP and also participated in two CCAA National championships in 1986 & 1987. Funk is also a huge baseball fan stemming from winning a Canadian championship with Whalley Little League in 1978 including a 5th-place finish at the Little League World Series that year.