With new players and coaching staff alike, the Georgetown University women’s lacrosse team is looking to shake things up this season.
After the departure of Head Coach Ricky Fried, who retired after 20 seasons with the most wins in program history, the team’s coaching staff has taken on a nearly entirely new look.
Following Fried’s retirement, Caitlyn Phipps was named the next head coach of the Hoyas last September. Phipps arrives at the Hilltop after 12 years as an assistant coach for the University of Maryland (UMD), where she won 4 national championships and 14 conference titles. Phipps enjoyed an illustrious playing career at UMD as well, where she won a Tewaaraton award recognizing her as the year’s most outstanding women’s lacrosse player, the ACC player of the year award twice and the 2010 NCAA tournament most outstanding player award en route to leading the Terrapins to a national championship win.
Phipps said the team has been working hard together during the offseason and that she is excited for a new era of Georgetown lacrosse.
“We can’t wait to kick off the 2025 season on Friday against American,” Phipps wrote to The Hoya. “The team has been hard at work this preseason preparing to compete at the highest level. We have a close-knit, motivated group with strong leadership that is ready to take the field and represent Georgetown with passion and determination — we are so excited to begin a new era of Georgetown Women’s Lacrosse.”
Phipps filled out her support staff with fresh faces as well. Alice Johns will join the staff as an assistant coach after three years as an assistant coach at Niagara University and a playing career at UMD under Phipps. Eloise Clevenger will be the director of women’s lacrosse operations after a standout playing career also at UMD. Assistant Coach Julie Morse is the lone coaching holdover from Fried’s staff and will enter her fourth season with the Hoyas.
The Hoyas will also face a fresh start on the playing front, with the team graduating 13 seniors and graduate players last spring. Notable losses include defender Maggie O’Brien (GRD ’24), who led the Hoyas with 58 draw controls last season, midfielder Tatum Geist (CAS ’24) and defender Melissa Massimino (MSB ’24). O’Brien was an all-Big East first team selection last season, and Geist and Massimino were all-Big East second team selections.
In addition to the three all-Big East players, the Hoyas will also be losing starters Kylie Hazen (MSB ’24) on attack and Margaret Lonergan (GRD ’24) on defense.
The 2024 season was surely one of highs and lows for the Hoyas, who finished third in the Big East. The team began the season with a pair of wins against regional opponents American University and Towson University before a dismal 8-game losing streak to round out the nonconference season, although four of the losses came against ranked teams. The Hoyas bounced back in Big East play, winning their first conference game of the season against Villanova University and only losing narrowly to the No. 12 University of Denver and the University of Connecticut. Their 7-11 overall and 4-2 Big East regular season records were good enough for third in the conference and a ticket to the Big East championship tournament in Cincinnati, Ohio, where they fell to UConn for the second consecutive game in the semifinals, bringing their season to an end.
Despite the senior losses, plenty of Georgetown’s stars are returning to the fold for 2025. On attack, senior captain Emma Gebhardt will look to produce another high-scoring season after recording 30 goals in 2024. Junior Gracie Driggs, a preseason all-Big East team selection who led the Hoyas in goals, points and free position goals last season, will also return.
In the midfield, Georgetown will lean heavily on senior captain Maley Starr, whose breakout season last year earned her a second team all-Big East selection. Starr led the Hoyas with 20 caused turnovers and recorded 22 goals, 9 assists and 27 ground balls, landing a unanimous preseason all-Big East selection ahead of this season as the only Hoya to be selected to the team unanimously.
On defense, senior captain Lily Athanas, a one-time Big East defensive player of the week and preseason all-Big East selection, will look to lead a back line that lost three starters from last season. Athanas recorded 30 ground balls and 34 draw controls for the Hoyas last season. Starter junior Kendall Steer will also return.
In goal, senior captain Leah Warehime will man the net for the second season in a row, coming off a second team all-Big East selection at the end of the 2024 season. Sophomore Olivia Shinsato will again be the backup, with first-year Amanda Reed also in the mix.
Accumulating significant playing time as substitutes last season, players such as senior defender Mikaila Kitchen, junior attacker Molly Byrne, junior midfielder Leanna Tsahalis and sophomore midfielder Reagan Ziegler could see increased playing time or potentially even a spot in the starting lineup.
The Hoyas’ newcomers will also buoy their performance this season, with a strong recruiting class and two graduate transfers. Graduate midfielder Rosie McCarthy returns home to D.C. after four seasons at Dartmouth College, where she recorded 35 ground balls and was a 2-year starter. Graduate attacker Hanna Bishop also joins the team from Washington and Lee University, where she registered a total of 223 goals and 125 caused turnovers as a 3-year starter. The team also welcomes seven first-years to the Hilltop. The standout among them is first-year defender Christina King, a graduate of St. Paul’s School for Girls from Baltimore, Md., who earned a spot on the Inside Lacrosse power 100 freshman rankings watchlist and should expect to see a fair amount of action this season.
Ranked fourth in this season’s Big East preseason poll, Georgetown will kick off their season against cross-District foe American Feb. 7 at Cooper Field. The team will then travel to College Park, Md., for Phipps’ first game against her former team, when they play UMD Feb. 18. Other highlights of the nonconference schedule include chances to avenge losses from last season against Johns Hopkins University, Loyola University Maryland and the University of Delaware in late February and early March.
The Hoyas will kick off conference play away at the University of Denver March 29 and will play a nationally televised home finale against Marquette University April 19 before rounding out their season April 26 with a chance to get revenge against UConn, the team that knocked the Hoyas out of the 2024 Big East tournament and ended their season.
In the upcoming months, the Hoyas will look to use new coaching strategies and young infusions to a solid veteran core to exceed expectations against a strong Big East conference and tough nonconference opponents throughout the season ahead.