Bob Coolen's thick Massachusetts accent and hard-nosed style of coaching never waned during his 34 years as head coach of the University of Hawai‘i softball team.
Coolen, 67, entered the year knowing it would be his last after previously announcing his retirement following the 2025 season. Coolen has remained stern in coaching the Rainbow Wahine, who are 29-17 overall and 15-9 in Big West Conference play and have already punched their ticket to next week's inaugural conference tournament.
A new element to Coolen's coaching style has emerged in his final year: Tears.
"Coach Bob is probably gonna get upset that I'm saying this, but he's been getting emotional on our road trips," senior catcher Izabella Martinez said. "We can all tell, and after every win, I could just tell that he's very grateful, and his gratitude is showing a lot more in every win that we have."
Coolen's biggest tell? His sunglasses. When they come on during talks to the team, he's usually trying to cover up.
"You can kind of tell when the glasses come on and he's talking to us, and he kind of gets softer toned, you know he's crying," Martinez said. In a previous series, "he just gave us a thumbs up, gave us a little clap. We don't really get that all the time. Usually, there's a lot of words that are spoken in our post game meeting. So getting that, and you could obviously tell he's crying."
More tears are virtually guaranteed this weekend. Coolen is set to coach his final set of home games at Rainbow Wahine Softball Stadium on Friday and Saturday against UC San Diego. The university is planning to pay tribute to Coolen prior to Friday's series opener, which takes place at 6 p.m. The original plan was to do so after Saturday's doubleheader, but Coolen preferred to have the focus be on his seniors on Saturday.
Coolen's family members, as well as a swath of former players, have flown in from the Mainland to witness his last set of home games.
"My emotions will run out of my eyes all Friday night," Coolen said. "Hopefully I'll be able to gather it so we can play at 6 o'clock. But after that, it will be emotional when the seniors leave, because I know this will be the last time they play on this field."
Sending Coolen out on a high note has been a motivating factor all season long for the Rainbow Wahine, who endured a gauntlet of five games in four days in California last week, going 3-2 to keep pace in the Big West race. A typical Big West week consists of one game on a Friday and two on Saturday, but last week, the 'Bows played doubleheaders on Friday and Saturday, squeezing in makeup games against CSUN and UC Santa Barbara in games that were originally postponed due to weather.
"Definitely sending him out with a bang," said reigning Big West Player of the Week Ellyanna Cinzori, who went 5-for-11 last week. "He's been pretty adamant about us making the Big West tournament, and we're really excited to be going there next week. That's been a really big goal, not for just coach Bob, but for definitely all of us. And we're really excited to celebrate him on Friday, and then the seniors, of course, on Saturday for senior day."
"It's definitely special," senior Chloe Borges said of ending her collegiate career with Coolen. "I know a lot of the girls have gotten to see a little bit of a different side of Bob over the years. He's changed since my freshman year to now. Everyone says he's a big softie now, which he is, but I definitely think it's nice for us to finish the chapter with him and know that he had us for all four years."
Following its series against UCSD, Hawai‘i will head to Fullerton for the Big West tournament, an event Coolen will finally get to coach in after advocating for it over the years.
"I'm just thinking about next week now, because it was a bucket list request that I had since (1991)," Coolen said.
Added Martinez: "The first three years, I think kind of halfway through the season, we kind of could get the vibe that (reaching the NCAA Tournament) isn't going to happen. It just wasn't our year. We'll try it again next year.
"But I think this year, coming into the season and knowing that there's that option at the end, there was just a lot more fight, I think, with everybody involved, and there was just a lot more passion this year, like every single girl has their heart set on making it to that tournament. We all just wanted to do it for each other, so it's really special."
Christian Shimabuku can be reached at christian@alohastatedaily.com.
