hockey, but you always knew family was No. 1”). Then there are Zenaty traditions she maintains to this day. Whenever the team turns onto Alden Street after an away game, win or lose, the players breaks into song, having all memorized the alma mater. “We now have a rap version,” she says with a smile. “They’re getting pretty good at it.” And the coaching tree has continued to bear fruit. This year
Springfield was knocked out of the playoffs by Babson, a team whose head coach—Julie Ryan—was a graduate assistant for Sharpe, and whose assistant—Lindsay Pardue—was a star Springfield goalie and later Sharpe’s maid of honor. “No place,” opines Sharpe, “produces more coaches.”
GYMNASTICS
The grand gymnastics tradition at Springfield College—which includes national championships, Olympians, and more than 100 years of the iconic Home Show—represents, above all, “a family,” according to women’s coach Cheryl Raymond G’80. The longest-standing head coach still going at Springfield,
Raymond is in her 34th season of a women’s program that formally started competition in 1964-65. “It’s been a huge part of my life,” she says. “It’s kind of directed what I’ve done and who I’ve become.” Without question, the Home Show, the showcase of the Springfield
College homecoming—an extravaganza that packs the gym year after year—creates a closeness that gymnasts never forget. “It shows the artistic side of gymnastics,” Raymond says. “It takes the sport and really lets the team members show the creativity and the artistry of it, rather than the competition. It has a unique beauty.” Being part of that, she says, naturally draws people together. “This
bond that we create with the men’s team is something unique and special that isn’t anywhere else,” says Raymond. “It’s a shared pride, a shared experience.” That’s easy to see through the experience of gymnasts who have
gone on to coach. One is Kelly Conlon Smith ’06, a middle school english teacher and eight-year gymnastics coach at Daniel Hand High School in Madison, Conn. Smith’s team is the defending Connecticut state champion. She is married to a former Springfield College gymnast, Michael Smith ’04.
“My biggest takeaway was how our team was so much like a
family,” Smith said. “It’s just this atmosphere where everybody is so close knit. That’s definitely a reflection of Cheryl and Pos (men’s coach Steve Posner) and the Home Show experience.” And the all-in-the-family gymnastics tradition has roots that sink
much deeper. Witness Springfield College Athletic Hall of Famer Gail Goodspeed ’74, G’75, who has been the head coach at the University of New Hampshire for 34 seasons. Goodspeed’s associate head coach for most of that time has been former Springfield College gymnast ed Datti ’71, Goodspeed’s husband. Back in the day, Goodspeed was a gymnast for Mimi Murray ’61, G’67, whose six-year coaching stint included more than just an astonishing 37-0 record. “Mimi Murray was a huge role model for me,” says Goodspeed.
“Mimi made gymnastics fun.” That lesson, she says, informs her approach to the job to this day: “People tend to coach the way they were coached.”
LACROSSE
With back-to-back NeWMAC Championships, the women’s lacrosse team is doing its part to carry the banner for the school. Springfield College has now posted 13 consecutive winning seasons, the last four coming under Kristen Mullady ’00. One of the all-time great lacrosse players at the school, Mullady
played for longtime coach Lynn Couturier ’81, DPe’86, the first full- time women’s lacrosse coach from 1989-2001. Springfield first fielded varsity teams in 1977, but the roots of quality women’s lacrosse at the school reach back even further. Missy Wassell Foote ’74 came to Springfield to study physical
education and play field hockey. She enjoyed those varsity experi- ences, but says her life turned around when she began playing club lacrosse. “All of a sudden,” she says, her voice lilting with wonder, “I could stand up and run with the ball. I remember thinking, ‘I love this. I love-love-love this!’” The ardor hasn’t faded. Upon graduation she got a high school
teaching job in Chester, Vt., and decided to start a girls’ lacrosse program. This was well before the sport’s recent boom in popularity and there were no sticks available, so Foote worked with her students
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