Ask anyone on the UMass field hockey team, and they’ll tell you that this is the year they’re taking home an Atlantic 10 championship. It’s easy to talk the talk, but this year, the Minutewomen made sure to walk the walk.
Prior to the team’s typical preseason, when all the coaches are allowed to come back on campus and conduct official practices, the players gathered together to run their own informal practices. They were able to build chemistry and cohesion so that they would already be in midseason form by the time the coaches arrived.
“It was new this year,” senior Jess Beech said of the squad’s ‘pre-preseason.’ “We all bought into the idea because we’re aiming and gonna get our A-10 victory this year, hopefully. So we were bought into it. We all arrived in July and decided that if this was the year we’re going to do it, we’re gonna do it with the full force.”
On paper, it certainly seems like this might be a team that’s capable of winning the coveted title. The Minutewomen were named the No. 2 team in the A-10’s preseason poll. They’re only behind St. Joseph’s, who has won four of the last five A-10 championships. The last time UMass walked away with the title was in 2016, and it will be a tough challenge for them to topple the reigning champs in St. Joe’s.
But head coach Barb Weinberg has confidence in her team, both new and returners. The team has 10 freshmen, but also a core group of returning seniors and a mix of new transfers and veteran players that bring a wealth of experience to the club.
“It’s a unique group, because we have such experience coming back,” Weinberg said. “So taking that experience and mixing that with our new players that are coming in, it’s mixing very nicely. That was our impression, it was a very strong newcomer class that we had, and they’ve bought into our philosophy and learned the structure of our system that we’re playing very, very quickly.”
The team’s leadership group is made up of four upperclassmen – Jess Beech, Emilie Keij, Josie Rossbach and Claire Danahy – all led by Beech, who was named to the A-10’s Preseason All-Conference Team. Each brings a different leadership style to the team, whether it’s Rossbach’s fierce competitiveness or Beech’s vocal leadership.
It’s not just Rossbach who brings a competitive edge to the field – this entire team brings a level of intensity that’s one of the team’s biggest assets.
“I definitely think this group is super competitive. Our practice sessions have been of really high intensity in comparison to previous years I’ve been on the team,” Beech said. “But our main kind of culture of all being mates or really wanting to support one another hasn’t changed, which is really nice to see.”
That intensity is driven by a coaching staff that has one of the most impressive resumes of any field hockey coach in the world. Weinberg serves as the head coach, helped by assistants Pietie Coetzee-Turner and Roxy Coetzee-Turner. All three are former field hockey players who have experience with their respective national teams; Weinberg played for Team USA and Pietie and Roxy Coetzee-Turner suited up for the South African team. Both Weinberg and Pietie Coetzee-Turner are Olympians (Coetzee-Turner a three-time Olympian who also holds the female all-time record for most international goals with 287), and the three all have a number of coaching accolades. Most recently, Weinberg was named the A-10’s co-head coach of the year in 2021, the fourth time a UMass field hockey coach had received the honor.
“We all balance each other really well, and we have our different areas of expertise… out of four different universities I’ve coached at, they’re the two best coaches that I’ve ever worked with,” Weinberg said of her assistants. “They’re just a wealth of knowledge and their motivation and passion to excel is shining through with our team right now. We’re the most competitive I’ve seen this team on a day-to-day basis.”
There are still some question marks that the team will have to answer as the season moves on – most notably, the starting keeper position is still up for grabs between junior Brooke Richards and freshman Myrte Van Herwijnen. Regardless of any adjustments they may have to make, Weinberg says that her team is focused on taking everything one game at a time with the focus on the conference championship.
“The A-10 has gotten stronger and stronger over the last five or six years,” Weinberg said. “We feel we’re right up there with the best and we will compete for a championship at the end of this year.”