June 25, 2008

by Clare Lochary, Lacrosse Magazine Online Staff

Ladies and gentlemen, your 2013 NCAA Division I women's lacrosse champions - the Yale Bulldogs!

Hey, it could happen. Anne Phillips has done it before.

Yale's new head coach took Division III Franklin and Marshall from chumps to champs in just five seasons. She did it at the high school level, transforming a 1-17 Owen J. Roberts team into Pennsylvania AA state champions between 1998 and 2001.

That's an average of less than five seasons to a title. Now she's going to give it a try in Division I.

"It was probably the most difficult decision I've ever made," Phillips said of leaving her alma mater, which she guided to a Division III title in 2007 and a return to the championship game in 2008.

"I always try to teach the players to never accept less than their best, to dare greatly and to always challenge themselves. That's exactly what this is for me."

Phillips was a member of the Diplomats' inaugural women's lacrosse team in 1977, but went down with the ubiquitous career-ending ACL tear after just two seasons. She graduated in 1981, and landed a job as a computer operations manager with a Fortune 500 company. Years later, a friend pestered her into taking the Roberts coaching job,where she found an adrenaline rush that corporate America didn't provide.

But her transition to the collegiate game was about anger, not ambition.

"I went back to Franklin & Marshall because they had dropped out of the top 20. And I was absolutely furious," said Phillips, who took over at F&M in 2003.

"I went back to not just get back to respectability, but to instill pride in the program and win a national championship."

She did just that, with a perfect 21-0 season and an NCAA crown in 2007. The Dips faltered in this year's title game, losing 13-6 to Hamilton. Phillips' original goal at F&M was to win back-to-back titles, "so that it really legitimized the first one," so she's leaving Lancaster with some unfinished business.

Yale will reap the benefits of that lingering dissatisfaction. The Bulldogs went 11-5 in 2008 under interim head coach Laura Field, a former assistant who was elevated in June 2007 when Mandee O'Leary left for the much-ballyhooed University of Florida job. Field's squad had a respectable showing, but three losses were in conference, dooming the Bulldogs' postseason hopes in the competitive Ivy League.

Determined to stay relevant, Yale sought out Phillips, the third-winningest active coaching in Division III (.795 percentage). Phillips felt that Ivy League lacrosse was a souped-up version of what she liked best about F&M, a selective D-III liberal arts school where academics and athletics went hand in hand.

"There is no greater compliment to a competitive academic experience than that of a competitive athletic experience. Goal-setting and leadership and perseverance - those things are more easily taught on an athletic field than in the classroom," said Phillips.

The Bulldogs lost two key players to graduation - midfielder and 2007 Tewaaraton finalist Lauren Taylor and All-American goalie Ellen Cameron - but Phillips is more focused on Yale's rising seniors. Although the Bulldogs aren't as down-and-out as other teams she has inherited, Phillips has a sense of urgency that stems from the premature end of her own playing career.

"I owe it to those seniors who have played for Yale to do everything in my power to make this team successful this year," Phillips said. "This will be a very intense year in that I want this to be successful for them in this year, not in three or five years."

Coaching Carousel

In other Pennsylvania-based women's lacrosse news, Lehigh named Jill Redfern head coach. Redfern was previously an associate head coach for the Mountain Hawks under Liz Brode Ota, who stepped down earlier this month. Lehigh finished 10-7 in 2008.

With Redfern's hire, there are two D-I women's lacrosse jobs remain open: Davidson and UConn. (The Huskies might be a nice fit for Field, if she doesn't stay at Yale as Phillips' assistant. Field is a Connecticut native.)

Sue Frost resigned from D-III University of Southern Maine to take the same position at the University of New England, replacing Julie Redman, who took a similar position at Converse College in Spartansburg, S.C. Before USM, Frost spent three years at D-I Binghamton, where she was the inaugural coach.