Cal Lutheran competes in 22 NCAA-sanctioned intercollegiate varsity sports: Men's sports (Kingsmen) include baseball, basketball, cross country, golf, football, soccer, swimming & diving, tennis, track & field, volleyball and water polo; while women's teams (Regals) include basketball, cross country, golf, lacrosse, soccer, softball, swimming & diving, tennis, track and field, volleyball, and water polo.
Football use CLU for training in 2016–19.|alt= The football team won the
NAIA National Championship in 1971, its only national championship to date. Head coach
Bob Shoup was named NAIA Coach of the Year that season. He led the Kingsmen to 13
NAIA District 3 Championships and the 5 playoffs in his 17 years as coach.
Women's volleyball In 2015, Regals volleyball won the national championship in
NCAA Division III women's volleyball, defeating
Wittenberg University 3–0 on November 21 in the team's third appearance in the final round. They were led by head coach Kellee Roesel. In 2016 the team made their ninth straight appearance in the NCAA Tournament and the 17th in school history. The team was ranked number two in the nation as of 2016. The women's volleyball team has for decades periodically been the strongest competitive women's sport at CLU. Already in the early 1960s, the team played schools such as
UC Santa Barbara,
Westmont College and
Cal State-Northridge. Handling most of the coaching for women until 1970 was Nena Amundson, who joined the faculty in 1961, hired by
Orville Dahl to organize the women's athletic programs. California Lutheran College (CLC) joined the
Association of Intercollegiate Athletics for Women (AIAW) when formed in 1971, and was a member until 1982 when women joined the men in the
NAIA. In 1970, the female athletes adopted the name Regals for all women's sports. The team was the runner-up for the 1995
NCAA Division III women's volleyball tournament. Notable players include Joyce Parkel, who was the captain of the volleyball team when it became a runner-up in Southern California in the late 1960s.
Olympic Gold Medal swimmer
Patty Kempner was the team captain when they qualified for the
AIAW Regionals in 1976. The coach while Kempner played was Diana Hoffman, a volleyball player who played on six national volleyball teams and was a member of the 1964 and 1968
U.S. Olympic teams. Guiding the team from last in the league to an
AIAW qualifier in two years, Hoffman is recognized for having laid the foundation for continued success for the Regals volleyball team.
Men's basketball vs
Pomona-Pitzer Sagehens, 2017. Luther Schwich coached the CLC basketball team from 1961–63 before John R. Siemens of
Westmont College became the college basketball coach and also assumed the role of Athletic Director upon Schwich's resignation. The first doctorate member of the department was Robert Campbell in 1966, who helped the academic status of the Physical Education Department. Notable individual contributions to the sport have included Al Kempfert in the 1960s, who held a 1967 record that stood for years before being toppled by Steve Jasper during the 1972–73 season.
Don Bielke, a former professional NBA player from the
San Francisco Bay Area and a standout at
Valparaiso, joined the staff as an instructor and coach in the 1970s. Two winning years are attributed to him: the 1977–78 and 1979–80 seasons. CLC hired Ed Anderson in 1983, a coach from
Pacific Lutheran University.
Mike Dunlap was the head coach from 1989–1994 and guided the Kingsmen to an 80–55 record. Notable CLU players include
Derrick Clark,
Tim LaKose, and
Jason Smith. Tim Fusina, former head coach at
Centenary University in
Hackettstown, New Jersey, became head coach for the team in 2017. Fusina took over after Geoff Dains, who was named interim head coach after the resignation of
Rich Rider, the winningest basketball coach in CLU history. Rider had a record of 345–207 in 22 seasons at Cal Lutheran. In the 2016 season, the Kingsmen basketball team went 20–7 past season and placed second in the
Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference with a 12–4 record, advancing to the Postseason Tournament for the seventh time. The team got a new head coach in 2019 when Russell White was hired. A former coach at Crespi High School, White has coached players such as
London Perrantes and
De'Anthony Melton. The
Los Angeles Lightning is a professional basketball team based at the
Gilbert Sports Arena.
Women's basketball The Regals basketball team plays its home contests at the Gilbert Sports and Fitness Center.
Wrestling In the mid-1960s, the college became known throughout the
NAIA District III as a wrestling power. Coach Don Garrison had a group of nineteen wrestlers who in 1969 won 12 and lost 3 matches and thereby capturing the NAIA District III championship. Upon Garrison's resignation, the team began losing more than it won, the sport subsided and funding became uncertain. Former Olympic wrestler
Buck Deadrich took over as coach in 1975 and the team consequentially began to move upwards again. Deadrich, who also served as the Sports Information Director, began recruiting wrestlers to the college. During his tenure, several of the CLC wrestlers competed in national events. Ed Fleming won silver in the
Pan American Games in 1980. Kim Coddington won 16 of 20 matches in 1977 and qualified for the national champion. Upon Deadrich’ resignation, the wrestling program struggled for about two years before being eliminated as a competitive sport. Football player
Brian Kelley was named the NAIA District III heavyweight wrestling champion in 1970.
Baseball Field. On May 30, 2017, the Kingsmen won their first
NCAA Division III baseball title under coach
Marty Slimak. Cal Lutheran defeated
Washington & Jefferson College 12–4 and 7–3 in the final two games of a best-of-three series, marking the team's sixth appearance in the championship round. Slimak has been the head coach since 1994 and is the winningest coach in CLU's history. The team has earned seven
Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (SCIAC) titles during his tenure and has never placed lower than fourth in the league standings. The team has recorded over twenty wins in all but one season and has not had a single losing season during Marty Slimak's tenure. He has guided three of his teams to the Division III
College World Series, where they were the runner-up in 1996 and the third-place finisher in 1999. The Kingsmen have played in three West Regionals. Eleven players have been drafted by
Major League Baseball (MLB) organizations during Slimak's tenure. Besides the
NCAA Division III national championship, Slimak has guided CLU to twelve conference championships, thirteen regional appearances and four World Series appearances. He was selected as the
American Baseball Coaches Association/Diamond National Division III
Coach of the Year in 2017. As of 2014, 24 players have been drafted for MLB organizations. Although Baseball Hall of Famer
Sparky Anderson never attended CLU, he helped raise money for the baseball team. Anderson, the only manager in history to have won
World Series championships in both the
American and
National Leagues, was approached by the team's coach in 1979 and came up with the idea of golf tournaments to raise money for scholarships. Anderson visited the campus regularly and the university baseball team plays their home games at George Lee "Sparky" Anderson Field, named in honor of the
MLB coach. The university was a five-minute walk from Anderson's residence in
Thousand Oaks. After his retirement, he became a frequent visitor to CLU games. Anderson has also used his influence to attract top names in the sport to the team. Several CLU players have been drafted for professional teams, including
Kevin Gross who was drafted by the
Philadelphia Phillies in 1983.
Jason Hirsh was drafted by the
Houston Astros in the second round of the
2003 Major League Baseball draft. MLB baseball player
Ron Stillwell was the baseball coach from 1972–1978, and had a record of 139–100–1 (.581) and was named "NAIA Coach of the Year" in 1976.
Rich Hill was the head coach from 1983–1985, and
Lindsay Meggs was the assistant baseball coach in 1988–89. A local baseball team,
Conejo Oaks, which competes in the
California Collegiate League (CCL), play their home games at the university's Ullman Stadium (
George Lee "Sparky" Anderson Field).
Men's track and field Under the coaching of
Don Green, men's track and field remained a perennial winner in the
NAIA. A former coach at
Pomona High School, Don Green joined CLC staff in 1970 as both a track coach and defensive football coach. In 1981, the team won the NAIA District III championship, and the track runners annually competed in nationwide events. 1984 was one of the college's best years in the national championship: Matt Carney finished sixth in the decathlon and earned an
All American honor with 6,269 points. In sprint relays, the team finished in sixth place with a time of 42,2 fielding a team of Ken Coakley, Roger Nelson, Maurice Hamilton and Troy Kuretich all earning All American honors. Green coached 44 All-Americans during his 21 years as coach of the track and field team. He has been inducted into the Mt. San Antonio Relays and
Southern Section halls of fame. Besides a coach, he was also the college athletic director for five years in the 1970s. He retired in 1991. Under the guidance of three different head coaches from 2000–2010, Kingsmen track and field has sent multiple representatives to compete at the
NCAA national championships. Over that decade, five athletes have earned individual
SCIAC titles and sixteen have made All-SCIAC with a top-six finish at conference finals.
Other sports teams.|alt= Other sports include golf, cross-country, water polo, lacrosse, softball, tennis, as well as swim and dive. The men's volleyball team experienced one of its best years in 1978 when it recorded a 15–3 season and entered the
NAIA national playoffs, where the team placed fourth in the nation under Coach Bob Ward and his assistant Don Hyatt. One of the best seasons for the men's golf team was in the 1982–83 season when CLC finished seventeenth in the national competition in Texas. During the next season, Coach
Bob Shoup sent
Greg Osbourne to compete in the national competition in Michigan, where he ultimately finished fourth. Osbourne captured the NAIA District III individual championship in 1984 and picked up
All-America honors, and raised the bar for the program. He later became a member of the
PGA and President of United States Golf Corporation. Men's soccer, which began as a club sport in the 1970s, was organized by Rolf Bell who wanted soccer to become an official sport at CLC. The team first gained recognition when Peter Schraml took over the program in 1978 and the team first recorded their 10–8 victory. Among the standout soccer players were Bruce Myhre, NAIA All Far West Honorable Mention and All District Second Team. Jack Carroll made All District First Team in 1984, while Chris Doheny earned Second Team All District Honors. Another notable player was Foster Campbell, who was named to the
SCISA Northern League First Team.
Per Ivar Roald, a former member of the Norwegian national youth team, played soccer for the Kingsmen in 1993. In the fall, he led the team with nine goals and seven assists. Another player,
Dave Salzwedel, later played in
Major League Soccer and the
American Professional Soccer League. In women's soccer, the Regals have won ten straight league championships. Regals soccer was ranked No. 8 in the 2018 NCAA Division III Western regional poll. It was also ranked No. 19 in the United States Soccer Coaches' national III. coaches poll in 2018. On December 2, 2023 with the women’s soccer team 1-0 win over Washington University at Roanoke College in Salem, Virginia, Regals soccer won their first ever national championship in program history. In women's cross-country, Cathy Fulkerson set a school record in 1982 and was the captain of the team for three years and a national
AIAW qualifier for three years. Fulkerson won
All-American honours at the AIAW nationals of 1979, and the women's team won the AIAW Regionals in 1981. Another standout in track and field was Beth Rockliffe who in 1981 won several school records, including in the high jump and
javelin. The women's softball team hosted the NAIA District III championships in 1984 and Kim Peppi won All District honors for her pitching. The head coach for the softball team is Debby Day, who also is the pitching coach for the
Israeli National Team. A Regals
lacrosse team will be added in the spring of 2020, making CLU the seventh university in
SCIAC to compete in women's lacrosse. The men's tennis team has captured NCAA singles (1996) and doubles (1997) titles. Coach John Siemens Jr. helped the team achieve a number two ranking in the NAIA District III race, the highest tennis achievements for the college.
Mike Gennette has been the women's and men's tennis head coach for 25 seasons and has coached players such as
Kayla Day and
Claire Liu. He received the 2016 Player Development Coach of the Year and received recognition from the
United States Tennis Association (USTA) and the
United States Olympic Committee during the
2017 US Open. Gennette has coached 11
All-America honorees for the Kingsmen. A tryout by the Olympic
USA Team Handball was held at the university in 2009. With over sixty athletes attending, it was the fourth such tryout organized by the sport's governing body and saw the biggest turnout. ==NCAA Championships==