A Skaneateles lacrosse coach has received a national recognition for her accomplishments.
Bridget Marquardt, varsity girls lacrosse coach for Skaneateles High School, was recently named a National Federation of High Schools Regional Coach of the Year.
The NFHS recognizes about 450 coaches each year with regional awards and about 20 receive a national honor.
Marquardt said she was surprised to hear that she was nominated and was honored by the recognition.
“I was kind of blown away. It’s a huge honor I think because it doesn’t encompass just lacrosse, it encompasses all my coaching I’ve done,” Marquardt said.
Working in a great district with a successful athletics program has been vital to her accomplishments too, she said.
“I certainly wouldn’t be in this position without my coaching staff and my athletic director and the community.”
Skaneateles Athletic Director Stacey Tice said Marquardt has been a distinguished coach for her work both on and off the field.
“Coach Marquardt has had a distinguished run as Skaneateles girls varsity lacrosse coach and we are looking forward to her continued service for many years. She uses lacrosse to promote the district’s commencement expectations and life skills. Coach Marquardt excels in developing exceptional lacrosse players who play multiple sports and also excel in the classroom. Her focus on developing a team enables students to thrive if they elect to continue playing lacrosse in college. We are very proud of Coach Marquardt and her well-deserved accomplishment as NFHS Regional Coach of the Year,” Tice said.
This spring will be Marquardt’s 13th year as the girls lacrosse coach, and her career has been marked by successes as a coach and a member of the community.
A field hockey player in college, Marquardt coached field hockey at Auburn and lacrosse and basketball at Jamesville-Dewitt before landing in Skaneateles as a high school physical education teacher and lacrosse coach.
Though she gave up teaching when she had children, Marquardt has been involved in numerous athletic programs in addition to being a lacrosse coach.
She was one of the people instrumental in establishing the Skaneateles High School’s girls ice hockey team starting in 2003. She also serves as the Section III women’s lacrosse chair on the state committee and is the president of the Skaneateles Girls Lacrosse Association.
As Section III chair she works to bring information from the state to coaches and organize tournaments. Recently, she helped raise money so that the sectional finals could be played in the Carrier Dome, where last year she coached the Lakers to a class C title and berth in the state finals.
The Skaneateles Girls Lacrosse Association is a local group that works to enrich the local youth and high school lacrosse programs. They organize summer programs and workshops to teach fundamentals as well as granting scholarships and giving back to the community. One highly visible act of the association that Marquard helps coordinate is taking donations and setting up American flags every year in Shotwell Park for Veterans Day.
In addition to recent successes on the field, Marquardt has had countless players get recruited to play NCAA lacrosse, some on scholarships. Skaneateles alumni who played for Marquardt have gone on to play at Syracuse University, Harvard, Johns Hopkins, Cornell, Duke, the University of North Carolina, Hofstra and others.
Marquardt said her job isn’t just to coach her players, but to help them prepare for their future.
“Hopefully I am going to help them with not just lacrosse, but with their future and moving on to college and some life lessons, because ultimately as an educator that certainly is more important than learning how to pass and catch.”
Joe Genco is the editor of the Skaneateles Press. He can be reached at [email protected].
