The Saint Rose College

ALBANY – An era of unprecedented growth within the athletics department at The College of Saint Rose will be highlighted by another milestone throughout the coming months. The College has announced that it will add the sport of men’s lacrosse with the goal of implementing a limited varsity schedule in 2011-12, and a full Northeast-10 Conference slate in 2012-13.

A national search for a head coach is currently underway, with that person expected to be on board this spring to primarily begin recruiting student-athletes for the fall 2011 freshman class.

“We are very pleased to announce our expansion into men’s lacrosse, a very popular sport in the Northeast. The creation of the new Christian Plumeri Sports Complex will provide top-notch fields for lacrosse, soccer, baseball and softball. In less than 10 years from the time we joined the Northeast-10 Conference, we have transformed our athletics facilities for intercollegiate and intramural sports to among the very best in the league,” said Saint Rose President Dr. R. Mark Sullivan.

Lacrosse, widely considered America’s first sport, is the fastest growing sport in the NCAA. The number of participants at the Division II level nearly tripled from 1981-82 to 2007-08 according to the NCAA Sports Sponsorship and Participation Rates Report covering that time frame. In 1981-82, 476 student-athletes took part in men’s lacrosse. That number ballooned to 1,258 in 2007-08.

Men’s lacrosse will mark the 18th intercollegiate athletics program sponsored by the College. Saint Rose reinstated men’s and women’s indoor track and field in 2007-08, a year after both outdoor programs were restored. Men’s golf was added in 1999-00. Student-athletes also don the Golden Knights logo in men’s and women’s cross country, women’s volleyball, men’s and women’s soccer, women’s tennis, men’s and women’s basketball, men’s and women’s swimming and diving, baseball, and softball.

Those teams have consistently performed superlatively both in the athletics arena and in the classroom. One hundred and thirty-four Saint Rose student-athletes were selected to the NE-10 Commissioner’s Honor Roll for the spring 2009 semester in recognition of earning at least a 3.0 grade-point-average (based on a 4.0 scale). Furthermore, those 134 representatives were derived from a demographic of 284 student-athletes and thus accounted for 47.2 percent of the school’s student-athlete population.

Their performance has been just as impressive in an athletic setting. The Golden Knights women’s soccer team has made two consecutive Championship Finals appearances, has qualified for seven NCAA Tournaments within the past eight years and this season became only the third squad in NE-10 history (1985) to win three consecutive postseason league titles. Additionally, the women’s volleyball team earned back-to-back NCAA bids in 2005 and 2006, while the men’s and women’s basketball teams have combined for nine NCAA Tournament appearances since 1999-00. Also, the baseball program advanced to the NCAA Division II World Series in 2000 and the NAIA World Series in 1990 under former head coach Bob Bellizzi. The program has won nearly 800 games throughout its 25-year varsity era.

Furthermore, former diver Brandon Birchak (’08) captured NCAA individual championships in both the one and three meter events in 2007, while the 1999-00 women’s basketball team won an NCAA Division II record 34 consecutive games. Saint Rose is also the lone college within the Capital Region to produce an NBA player, Garth Joseph.

Saint Rose, which joined the NE-10 in 2000-01, has also witnessed unparalleled growth to its athletics facilities. The institution has invested some $13 million dollars towards two major projects. The renovation of the Events and Athletics Center was finished in 2004 and the nearly completed Christian Plumeri Sports Complex, in a dual partnership with the city of Albany, will feature an all-weather lacrosse/soccer facility in addition to baseball and softball diamonds, and a practice field.

The College has furthermore made its Hall of Fame ceremony an annual event to help foster a sense of community between various generations of Golden Knights student-athletes.

As for the NE-10, Saint Rose will become the 12th conference member to sponsor men’s lacrosse. The Golden Knights will join Assumption, Adelphi, Merrimack, Southern New Hampshire, Saint Anselm, Pace, American International, Le Moyne, Saint Michael’s, Bentley and Franklin Pierce. Upstate rival Le Moyne has appeared in each of the last four national championship games and came away with two national titles during that span.

Overall, the NE-10 sponsors championships in 23 different sports, the most of any NCAA Division II conference.