Montreat College

Montreat College Athletics
310 Gaither Circle Montreat, NC 28757

NAIA North Carolina Southeast

Private Very Small Competitive team

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Coaches

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Michael Bruce

Michael Bruce joined the coaching staff at his alma mater following his graduation in 2013 with a degree in business administration with a concentration in sports management. He completed his sixth season as head coach after the 2022 campaign.

Following a few seasons as an assistant on the staff, Bruce took the helm of the program in 2017, a year in which the Cavs went 11-9. After a down season in 2018, Montreat rebounded with another 11-win campaign prior to a second consecutive .500 year in 2020. In 2021, the Cavaliers notched a 7-6 AAC record and upset No. 10 Milligan in the quarterfinals of the AAC Tournament. The 2022 season saw the Cavs tally a 6-10-2 (5-7-1 AAC) record.

During the 2021 season, Montreat racked up three All-AAC honorees, two CoSIDA Academic All-District First Team selections and one CoSIDA Academic All-America Second Team nod. In 2022, 14 players made the AAC All-Academic Team, 11 were Daktronics NAIA Scholar Athletes, two claimed Academic All-District First Team recgnition and one hauled in Academic All-America Second Team honors.

In his first season with the Cavaliers in 2013, the assistant coach and goalkeeper coach helped goalkeeper Lucas Carvalho to his second straight Appalachian Athletic Conference First Team selection. Under Bruce’s guidance Carvalho had a career season in shutouts (6), goals against (17), goals against average (1.02), and wins (7) while playing a career-high 1,494 minutes.

Bruce made nine starting appearances for the Cavaliers in 2010 before injuries cut his career short. In his lone season in a Cavalier uniform, the East Kilbride, Scotland native allowed just 1.02 goals against, ranking him 41st in the NAIA.

Prior to Montreat, Bruce played two seasons at Shorter (Ga.) where he appeared in 19 career matches for the Hawks and for Alloa Athletic FC of the Scottish Second Division where he played as a youth.

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Ryan Griswold

Extension 4020

In late July of 2022, the Montreat men’s soccer program hired former graduate assistant Ryan Griswold as its new assistant coach. Griswold immediately started his duties in preparation for the 2022 season.

Griswold came to the Cavaliers in the spring of this year, where he acted as a graduate assistant with the program. Prior to his duties with Montreat, he lived in Peru as a sports missionary. There, Griswold served as a soccer coach and physical education teacher to children in the San Juan de Lurigancho district outside of Lima, Peru.

Before acting as a missionary, the Auburn, Ga. native spent time as the volunteer assistant coach for the Horizon Christian Academy Boys’ Soccer Team. During the 2018 season, Griswold and head coach Dr. Chung Lee led the Warriors to a second-place result at the 2018 Georgia Independent Christian Athletic Association (GICAA) Division 2A State Championship.

Griswold also developed younger athletes’ skills in the sport throughout his high school, collegiate and post-academic time. In 2013, he was a personal soccer trainer with the United Futbol Academy, training different teams from ages five to 16. At the academy, Griswold facilitated soccer drills that maximized player development and ensured a fun and enjoyable environment to help players of all levels.

While in college, Griswold was a volunteer soccer coach, life coach and personal faith mentor with Operation Get Active, a ministry that uses sports as a platform to love and serve several of Chattanooga, Tenn.’s underprivileged children. During his two years with the ministry, Griswold facilitated the understanding and implementation of making healthy life choices such as diet, exercise, nutrition and spiritual health. Griswold spent his summers from 2014 to 2016 as a head coach and summer sports counselor with McCallie School, an elite all-boys boarding school. There, he established a healthy sports environment for young men and helped to build them into leaders outside of sports. Before his assistance with Horizon Christian Academy, he was a volunteer and staff coach for CFC Academy in Chattanooga with the organization’s elite youth U9 teams.

Griswold played soccer while earning his bachelor's degree in communication studies: corporate communications and leadership from Bryan College in Dayton, Tenn. An outside back with the Lions from 2013 to 2017, Griswold led Bryan to a pair of Appalachian Athletic Conference (AAC) regular-season titles and an AAC Tournament Championship in 2013. The team made two NAIA National Tournament appearances and was a mainstay in the national rankings while Griswold played.

Griswold resides in Black Mountain, N.C.