Head Coach Todd Eisner

The 2022-23 basketball season will mark the eighth year that Todd Eisner has been the head coach of the Warrior men's basketball program and his 25th season overall as a head coach at the collegiate level.

In 2021-22, Eisner led the Warriors to a 15-11 overall record and a return to the NSIC playoffs. The 2021-22 campaign saw WSU start the year with a three-game winning streak and included a highlight reel win on the road at Northern State, when the Warriors beat the Wolves 83-74 in front of 3,500 fans in Aberdeen. In addition, nearly 1,000 fans saw Winona State defeat Minnesota State 73-59 at home, the best attended contest of the season in McCown Gymnasium last year. The Warriors were an impressive 8-3 on home court last season and qualified for the NSIC postseason, hosting a first-round contest against the University of Mary.

Eisner reached a monumental coaching milestone during the pandemic shortened 2020-21 season, winning his 500th career game on February 13 with a 77-58 victory over Concordia-St. Paul.  His career head coaching record is now an impressive 501-240, with stops at Viterbo University, Bellevue University, Benedictine College and Midland University, prior to arriving at Winona State University in August 2015.

Eisner has been instrumental in developing championship level basketball programs, both on and off the court, throughout his career.  He is the only coach in NAIA Division II history to lead three different programs to the Elite Eight of the national tournament - Viterbo, Bellevue and Midland -  with two of those programs advancing to the national championship game (Bellevue, Midland) on three separate occasions (2004, 2008, 2014).  The success of the Midland program during their 2013-14 national runner-up campaign earned Eisner the 2014 NAIA Division II Rawlings National Coach of the Year Award.

In 17 seasons as a head coach at the NAIA level, Eisner had five teams win at least 30 games in a season and 11 of those programs qualified for the NAIA Division II national tournament.  Player development has always been a high priority in his programs and during his time at the NAIA level, Eisner had a player named either first-team, second team or third team NAIA All-American six times.

Since taking the helm of the program, Eisner has an overall Warrior record of 100-85, good for a .541 winning percentage, including three third place finishes in the always competitive NSIC South and two appearances in the NSIC Tournament semi-finals.  Building an offensive philosophy with a mantra of wanting all five players on the court to be a threat behind the three-point line, the 2019-2020 Warrior squad set an NSIC record for most three-point field goals made (248) and attempted (656) in conference play.  The Warriors also set a NSIC record for an individual game during the shortened pandemic season in 2020-2021 with 47 three-point field goal attempts at Augustana.

The Warriors have had at least one player gain NSIC All-Conference recognition in every one of Eisner’s seasons in charge, including most recently Alec Rosner following the 2021-22 season.  Prior to Rosner's accolades,  Kevion Taylor was named all-conference three times, including two first team nods in 2020 and 2021.  Caleb Wagner was also named all-conference multiple times, with 1st team recognition in 2020 and 2nd team status in 2018.  Tommy Gathje, Riley Bambenek and Kyle Bauman each were named to the NSIC All-Conference team during Eisner’s time on the Warrior sideline.

Another Warrior standout, Devin Whitelow, orchestrated the Winona State offense during his time in McCown Gymnasium and the Warriors finished first overall in NCAA Division II for the Fewest Turnovers Per Game in 2020, only turning the ball over 8.7 times per game.  Whitelow received national recognition in 2019 when he broke the NCAA record at any level by producing the best Assist to Turnover Ratio for a season with 5.96 assists for every turnover committed. Whitelow concluded his career by earning the inaugural Don Olson Outstanding Senior Award from the NSIC.

Excelling in the classroom will always be a priority for any program that Eisner is involved with, and the Warriors have done an outstanding job being true student-athletes during this time.  The team has finished with a cumulative GPA of over 3.0 in each of Eisner's season.  The National Association of Basketball Coaches (NABC) has recognized the Winona State men’s basketball program with the prestigious NABC Team Academic Excellence Award every season since 2015.  Also, in 2020-21, the Warriors placed seven student-athletes on the NABC Honors Court for academic excellence, which was the highest total of players of any team in the NSIC that season.

A 1991 graduate of Creighton University with a double major in finance and business management, Eisner was an integral part of two Missouri Valley Conference championships and two appearances in the NCAA Tournament in 1989 and 1991.  He led the MVC in three-point field goal percentage during the 1988-1989 season and was named a captain of the Bluejays the following season.

The Chilton, Wisconsin native played high school ball for his father, Jim, where he led the Tigers to the 1986 WIAA Class B state championship.  He finished his high school career with 1,840 career points.  Eisner was enshrined in the Wisconsin Basketball Coaches Association Hall of Fame as a player in 2014.  In 2017, he was also inducted into the Chilton High School Wall of Honor and the Bellevue University Athletics Hall of Fame for his coaching accolades.

Eisner resides in Winona with his wife, Andrea, who is an administrator in the Arcadia (Wis.) School District.