Julie Duffy Head Women’s Lacrosse Coach Merrimack College
The first interview I did was with Julie Duffy the head women’s lacrosse coach for Merrimack College. Merrimack College is located in North Andover, Massachusetts. Coach Duffy’s general responsibility as the Head Coach is to run all aspects of the women’s lacrosse program. Within that she manages budgeting for the team the budgeting includes hotels while traveling, meals for the team, gear/equipment, and home game day operations. She also handles most of the recruiting for the incoming classes but with the help of her coaching staff they pitch in with half of the recruitment. Coach Duffy has to manage retention of her athletes each year along with the student-athlete development of each player throughout their four years with her. One of the most important parts of her responsibilities is the practice and game planning. This is important that this gets done because this plays a huge role in making her team successful. After speaking with Coach Duffy we discussed some of her likes and dislikes about her job. Some of her likes included the freedom she has to control her own program; she loves to work with her student-athletes, teaching the sport she loves, and the flexibility in work hours. Her dislikes about her job were having to deal with some parents, amount of hours put in during the season, the low pay for the amount of time, and how long it takes to work up the ladder in higher positions. Coach Duffy works about eighty hours or more a week depending on if the team is in fall ball, off-season, or regular season. She makes $75,000 a year with full benefits like health care, dental, vision, and retirement. She has a five-year contract that has incentive bonuses, for example, if her team’s GPA is above a 3.0 or the team makes it to a different level of postseason she will receive different monetary bonuses. With her contract, it guarantees that her assistant coach’s salary the throughout duration of Coach Duffy’s contract. Coach Duffy received her bachelor’s degree from Hartwick College in Secondary Social Studies Education and Political Science. She then got her master at Ithaca College in Exercise and Sports Science: Sports Psychology. Coach Duffy has been in the coaching field for eleven years now. She also has her teaching licenses. I asked what Coach Duffy’s favorite memory is, she said, “Anytime you see a player finally understand what you are teaching them. I call it the lightbulb moment. The lightbulb moment and watching them graduate are what I live for!” I then went on to ask Coach Duffy how hard it is to obtain a position in the coaching field was. She then explained that it is not hard at all to find a job coaching women’s lacrosse because there are so many programs adding women’s lacrosse to their schools. Coach Duffy shed some light on industry information as we talked. She claimed that the salary for a women’s lacrosse coach can range from $20,000 to $300,000 but the average coach makes about $55,000 a year. She said that the turnover in women’s lacrosse is high especially at the beginning of one’s career. Coach Duffy explained that the opportunity for advancement is challenging and depends on your initial opportunity you get. I then asked Coach Duffy if she had any advice for someone like myself pursuing a career in the women’s lacrosse coaching field. She said that it is important to start connecting with people early and be prepared for very long hours, with very minimal pay. It took her over ten years to break above the $45,000 salary range, with a good record as a head coach. Also, don’t just settle for a job. She said to also have a five, ten, fifteen-year plan. Make sure the first job you are taking is matched up with an opportunity for you to grow. Do not be in it for the money, it is not there, and you will always take the wrong job if that is what you are looking for. She expressed that coaching is amazing, but you must love it in order to survive it. I then thanked Coach Duffy for taking the time out of her busy day to talk with me and help expand my knowledge about this amazing career field.
Tim Florence Head Women’s Lacrosse Coach Wheeling Jesuit University
The second interview I did was with Tim Florence the head women’s lacrosse coach for Wheeling Jesuit University. Wheeling Jesuit University is located in Wheeling, West Virginia. Coach Florence’s general responsibility as the Head Coach is to run all aspects of the women’s lacrosse program. He handles the recruiting for the incoming players and classes. He spends time throughout the team’s offseason looking for future cardinals. He deals with budgeting for the team the budgeting includes hotels while traveling, meals for the team, gear/equipment, and home game day operations. Coach Florence spends some valuable time on practice and game planning to ensure that his team is successful when it comes to game time. When then started to discuss his likes about coaching and he explained that he enjoys practice planning where he can really break things down and coach his players one-on-one or overall as a team. He also likes helping develop the student-athletes during their 4 years at Wheeling Jesuit, getting to know his players from recruitment thru graduation and then after, breaking down film, and getting to know other coaches and talking with them about in’s and out’s. Coach Florence’s did have some dislikes about his job he expressed such as fundraising, recruiting, worrying whether he can get enough student-athletes in each recruiting class to appease the administration, worrying about whether or not student-athletes will be eligible, and retention: worrying about whether or not players will come back. Coach Florence explained that the school would like him to have some type of set schedule but realizes that coaches typically work far more hours than most administrative or staff workers, therefore, they do give some flexibility on work hours. As for the attire, he said they expect you to dress professionally but there are exceptions due to times when the team is practicing or game day. Coach Florence said, “My advice to a young coach is dressing the part…around the office, you should be in business casual and on the field you can be in practice attire.” Coach Florence make in the mid-thirty thousand a year. He said that his salary is not much considering his experience but he loves his job to get worked up over the pay. He conveyed that he did not get into teaching or coaching for the money it was always for the love of the job. He does get full benefits that include health care, dental, vision, and retirement. He expressed his love for getting new team gear each year that was one of the best benefits. Coach Florence received his bachelor’s degree from The Ohio State University and his masters from Wheeling Jesuit University. He has been coaching college lacrosse for eleven years now and twenty-five years coaching lacrosse overall with related experience as an Assistant Head of School, Dean of Students, and Registrar. Coach Florence’s favorite memory was seeing the reactions of the team after they won their first conference championship. I then ask how hard is it to obtain a position in the coaching field is. He answered with that it all depends on level, position, or place where you are trying to coach. He explained that getting a coaching position now at the collegiate level is pretty easy. There are positions open or currently available right now and not enough people to fulfill the positions. I asked Coach Florence to explain some of the industry information further for me. I started by asking what was the salary range for a college women’s lacrosse head coach, he replied with somewhere between $20,000 and $200,000. He then explained that the turnover was high within the women’s lacrosse coaching business either to due job hopping, stress, getting out of coaching, family reasons. Opportunity for advancement he claimed, like any field there is a tremendous opportunity to advance as long as you are dedicated and continue to work hard. I then asked Coach Florence if he had any advice for someone like myself pursuing a career in the women’s lacrosse coaching field. Coach Florence advised, “Seek out your coach and see what jobs are available. The IWLCA will put out your name and resume if you are seeking a position and they will also put out a list of schools with openings. Prepare to work hard and know that no job is beneath you. A majority of coaching at the college level, especially D2, is paperwork. Lots of it. There is no set schedule so you have to have a good deal of self-discipline so that you stay on track and things get accomplished. There is a great deal of time working with under little or no supervision. You will wear many hats…the greatest of coaches are well versed in many areas like group dynamics, psychology, motivation, strength trainer, travel agent, social media coordinator, gear designer, stick stringer, net fixer-upper, field striper, launderer, tailgate coordinator…whatever you can think of, you will be doing it.” I then thanked Coach Florence for taking the time out of his busy day to talk with me and help me understand more about this amazing career field.