Brian Meisner is in his fourth season as an assistant men's hockey coach under head coach Rich McKenna in 2023-24. He works primarily with the defensemen and handles the defensive side of the game. Meisner brings a plethora of knowledge to the Yellowjackets, as the 2023-24 season marks his 31st year of coaching.
Meisner played his collegiate hockey across the bridge at the College of Saint Scholastica (CSS), where he would earn team MVP honors during his senior year. After the conclusion of his playing career, he would earn his first coaching gig at his alma mater. After three seasons with the Saints, he was named the head coach at Duluth Central High School for a season. Meisner's next destination landed him as an assistant coach and assistant general manager of the Waterloo Black Hawks of the United States Hockey League (USHL) for four seasons. Additionally, he had stints as the head coach for Suffolk PAL in Long Island, N.Y., and the Butte Irish in the American West Hockey League (AWHL). There, Meisner was both the head coach and general manager before the team disbanded in 2002.Â
Wichita Falls, Texas was Meisner's next stop, serving as both the head coach and general manager for the Wichita Falls Wildcats (previously known as the Rustlers, and before that, the Butte Irish) for five seasons. In 2007 he would return to collegiate hockey, serving as an assistant for NCAA Division I Connecticut for one season, then heading north to assist the Nanooks of NCAA Division I Alaska-Fairbanks for four seasons.Â
In 2014, Meisner was tabbed as associate head coach for the Minnesota Wilderness of the NAHL, a year they would win the Robertson Cup Championship. After the season concluded, Meisner would coach youth hockey in Cloquet, Minn., before being hired as an assistant at UW-Superior in 2020. Meisner was on staff when the Yellowjackets won the WIAC Championship during the 2020-21 season.
Meisner graduated from CSS with a Bachelor of Arts degree in communications in 1993. He and his wife Kate reside in Cloquet.
