In May of 2021, Lynn Leong was promoted from interim head coach to Brooks G. Ragen Director of Squash and serves as head coach for both women's and men's teams. She joined the Bulldogs in 2017 as a senior assistant coach and was promoted to associate head coach in 2019 and interim head coach in 2021.
She helped build the rosters for both teams since her arrival and her efforts and coaching aided the women's team in its rise to a No. 3 national finish in 2019-20, as well as two All-American selections for the men's team in 2020.
After taking over as head coach since the 2021-22 season, Leong has led the men's team to the CSA semifinals in four consecutive seasons. In 2024-25, the Bulldogs reached the CSA Championship Match for the first time since 2016. On the women's side, Leong took the Bulldogs to the semifinals in 2024. Both teams have not finished outside of the top-eight in the CSA rankings during her tenure.
Leong has coached 18 CSA All-Americans and over three dozen CSA Scholar Athletes. Leong coached Siow Yee Xian '24, a 2024 finalist for the Skillman Award.
Leong is the second Ragen Director of Squash after Talbott. She is the first ever woman to coach the men's squash team at Yale. Leong is the third woman to direct the women's program and the first Asian-American squash head coach at Yale.
Leong won two national team championships as a player at Trinity College, from where she graduated in 2005. Since coming to the U.S. from Malaysia in 1999, she has been a two-time Interscholastic individual champion at St. George's School (R.I.) and a three-time, first-team All-American at Trinity.Â
The former photography major in college started playing squash at her father's club in Malaysia at the age of four and achieved a world professional ranking of 40 by the age of 16. She was the Asian Women's Champion (Jordan, 1996), a finalist in the U19 British Junior Open and a finalist in the World Junior Championship (Belgium, 1999).Â
Leong began her coaching career at the Apawamis Club in Rye, N.Y., in August of 2007, working under Hall of Fame squash legend Peter Briggs. She has also served as the Squash Director at the New Haven Lawn Club (NHLC) from 2007-2017. While at the NHLC, she nurtured numerous players to achieve top U.S. junior rankings, including future Yale student-athletes.
Leong, who received her level 3 squash coaching certification from U.S. Squash in 2015, helped coach two runner-up U.S. junior women's teams at the World Junior Championship (2013 and 2015) while serving as the assistant coach.
Leong, who is a Davenport College Fellow, lives in Branford, Conn., with her husband, Yiming, and daughter, Blake.
