Lincoln Stars Head Coach Rocky Russo has been named USHL Coach of the Year, the league announced Thursday.
Russo is Lincoln's first Coach of the Year in the USHL Tier-1 era and second in team history.
All end-of-season league awards were nominated and voted upon by team general managers.
Russo guided the Stars to the league's best regular-season record in his fourth season in Lincoln. The Stars earned their second Anderson Cup in Tier-1 team history with a 44-15-3-0 mark.
Russo has overseen a team that has gone 143-86-12-7 and won four playoff series. This campaign represents the second time in the last three seasons the Stars have advanced to the Western Conference Finals.
Under Russo’s guidance, the Stars made significant improvement from the 2023-24 season. In addition to setting a team benchmark for wins in the regular season, the Youngstown, Ohio native steered his squad to a 32-point turnaround from last season, when the Stars finished 27-30-3-2 and sixth in the Western Conference. Lincoln set the record for longest winning streak this season with 12 straight wins from Jan. 10 through Feb. 14.
Russo wasn’t the only one from the Stars to receive recognition. the league also announced Thursday that general manager Nick Fabrizio was named General Manager of the Year. USHL goalie of the year Yan Shostak, forward Jack Pechar, and defenseman Etienne Lessard were named to the All-USHL Teams for the 2024-25 season, and goaltender William Prowse was named to the All-USHL Rookie Team earlier this week.