Fourth in a collection of weblog articles protecting the quarter century of TopOfTheCircle.com highlighting lacrosse.
As a lot as lacrosse is about gamers and groups, they’d be nowhere with out nice teaching. And the world of women and girls’s lacrosse has been chock stuffed with nice teaching over the previous quarter century.
In Division I, the very best coaches for me have been Cindy Timchal from Maryland and Kelly Amonte-Hiller from Northwestern. All had dynastic eras within the final thirty years of the game, due to recruiting and improvements in gear and sports activities science.
There have been different nice teaching performances over time, together with these of Princeton’s Chris Sailer, Virginia’s Julie Myers, UNC’s Jenny Slingluff-Levy and Boston School’s Acacia Walker-Weinstein.
Sailer specifically deserves credit score for the best way the sport has modified over time. She was an absolute genius when it got here to creating matchup issues for the opposition, particularly within the early to mid-Nineties when all eleven outfielders have been allowed to leap into the offense.
Within the decrease divisions there is just one identify for me: Sharon Goldbrenner-Pfluger. The Trenton State/The School of New Jersey head coach has greater than 650 victories on the lacrosse subject, in addition to quite a few nationwide championships.
Pfluger was additionally an important servant of ladies’s sports activities at Hillwood Lakes, successful greater than a thousand video games in each hockey and lacrosse over greater than 75 seasons mixed in each sports activities. She is one in every of solely a dozen coaches featured within the NCAA Corridor of Champions in Indianapolis.
There have been a number of memorable coaches on the faculties that I’ve met over the previous 25 years. A kind of is Angela Tammaro, who has practically 1,500 wins in each subject hockey and lacrosse at Greenwich (Conn.) Academy.
I additionally had the pleasure of interviewing Kathy Jenkins, the one coach to play Alexandria St. Stephen’s/St. Agnes (Va.) has had some expertise since she began this system in 1976. Since then, she has racked up 850 wins as head coach of the Saints. She’s taken the onerous route relating to planning the group, touring all the best way to Florida for competitors after which enlisting quite a few regional and nationwide powers for a collection of competitions within the annual Spring Fling.
One other necessary coach of the previous quarter century is Chris Robinson. Whether or not he was teaching Ellicott Metropolis Mount Hebron (Md.), Owings Mills McDonogh (Md.) or Orlando Lake Highland Prep (Fla.), he was capable of finding success along with his groups. He harnessed the expertise and instilled in them a relentless drive for perfection via excellence in successful the attracts and executing the assault.
Equally matched when it comes to with the ability to give groups a way of ruthlessness is Brooke Kuhl-McClelland, who took over from Robinson at Mount Hebron. McClelland, who coached dance groups in Howard County, Maryland for a few years, used a lot of these ideas of motion and duty to create just about unstoppable groups.
Extra not too long ago, many individuals have taken be aware of the work Darien (Conn.) head coach Lisa Lindley has accomplished for the Blue Wave. Lindley coached maybe the very best season the college has ever had final 12 months, together with her five hundredth profession teaching victory. She received the TopOfTheCircle.com United States Coach of the 12 months Award following a state championship season wherein the group not solely performed in what turned out to be America’s best league, but additionally performed one sport below barely completely different guidelines than what the Wave makes use of. Disagreeable.