Phillylacrosse.com, Posted 11/13/19
Staff Report
Unionville has named former William and Mary head coach Tara Brown as its head girls’ lacrosse coach.
Brown replaces Suzanne Sheehan who left to take a new teaching and coaching position after last season. Sheehan was the Phillylacrosse.com Co-Coach of the Year in 2018 when she guided the Indians to their first state title.
Brown has served as a youth coach in the Unionville area the past few years and has coached recreational and travel youth programs in Virginia and Pennsylvania for the past 13 years. She was the W&M coach from 2000-07.
Under Brown, the College returned to the national lacrosse scene, consistently appearing in the IWLCA and Inside Lacrosse national rankings. After going 10-8 and reaching the title game of the CAA Championship, the Tribe finished the 2004 season ranked at No. 16, its highest final ranking since 2001 when W&M also gained an at-large bid to the NCAA Championship under Brown.
During seven seasons at the helm, Brown mentored 19 different student-athletes to all-conference honors, including current seniors Colleen Dalon and Morgan Lang, who were each three-time All-CAA performers. Five of Brown’s student-athletes received All-America status.
Brown was named Virginia’s State Coach of the Year (by the Virginia Sports Information Directors) in 2001, after leading the Tribe to its first winning record and NCAA postseason appearance in three years (1998). The squad ended postseason play with a final national ranking of No. 10 and a 9-7 overall record.
Brown came to the Williamsburg campus after spending two seasons (1998-99) at the University of Connecticut as the top assistant. Prior to working at UConn, Brown held similar positions at Cornell University (1996-97) and The College of New Jer-sey (1994-96).
A 1993 graduate of the University of Virginia, Brown was a varsity athlete in both field hockey and lacrosse for four seasons while in Charlottesville. She played defensive wing on Virginia’s national championship lacrosse squads in the 1991 and 1993 seasons and earned second team All-America honors in 1993. Brown spent two seasons as a member of the United States Na-tional Lacrosse Team (1993-95) and was an Academic All-American as well. Also a standout in field hockey, she served as captain of the squad for her junior and senior seasons.
