Women's lacrosse has changed in Rappoli's 19 years

Like any good coach, women's lacrosse coach Carol Rappoli is changing with the times.

In the past, Rappoli -- now in her 19th year at Tufts -- often recruited one-dimensional players for either attack or defense. That is not always the case anymore.

"In the past, defensive players used to be big or fast, but they didn't always have great stick skills," Rappoli said. "Now, a lot of defenders have superior stick skills... So we have a lot of kids who can play attack and defense."

And as the women's lacrosse program kicks off its 30th season this spring, it will feature an attack that will try to take advantage of the team's athleticism and ability to play multiple players at multiple positions.

"We're kind of rearranging the team this year," senior tri-captain Lauren Peach said. "We don't really have any weak links, because most of us can play anywhere."

Rappoli hopes that this style of play can help produce a turnaround from last season, when the team needed to eke out a 6-5 win over Conn. College in its last game of the season to prevent a losing record.

Remarkably, the Jumbos have never finished with a losing record under Rappoli. A graduate of Northeastern University, she took the head coaching positions of the field hockey and lacrosse teams in 1985 and has created the program since then.

During her career, Rappoli has an overall record of 168-68-1, a 71.1 winning percentage. From 1986-89, Rappoli coached the Jumbos to four consecutive ECAC championship victories and added another in 1995.

Before coming to Tufts, Rappoli coached successful lacrosse programs at Colgate University and Wellesley College. She was also a player of the U.S. National Lacrosse team in 1977-78 and in 1980.

Rappoli is from Lincoln, Massachusetts, and traditionally most of the Jumbo lacrosse players have come from the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic, where the sport is most popular.

However, lacrosse's increased popularity over the past decade is another drastic change that the coach has witnessed. This year, the bulk of the team still hails from the region, but sophomores Dena Miller and Hilary Pentz are from Denver, Colorado, and Seattle, Washington, respectively.

Rappoli predicts more change ahead.

"In a couple of years you'll see kids on our roster from Florida, Utah, St. Louis," she said. "There's an explosion in women's lacrosse, because it's a wonderful sport. It's a great game to play, it's great to watch, and it's great to coach.