W&M to Host 2004 CAA Field Hockey Championship this Weekend

11/05/04 9:15AM

- William and Mary's field hockey team, ranked 13th in the nation, will host the 2004 Colonial Athletic Association Championship this weekend at Busch Field ... Also competing for the conference title will be Old Dominion, Delaware and Hofstra.

Complete CAA Tournament Media Notes (PDF, 160 KB)


About the Tribe
William and Mary enters the 2004 Colonial Athletic Association Championship ranked 13th in the nation with an overall record of 13-6 ... The Tribe won the CAA regular season title with a perfect 7-0 league record, earning the right to host the CAA Championship ... This is the first time in school history that the Green and Gold has won an outright conference title, as the Tribe set a school record for conference wins in a season ... CAA Player of the Year Kelly Giles leads the team with 34 points, 14 goals and five game-winning goals, and is second on the team with six assists ... CAA second team pick Ginny Sutton is second on the team with 19 points and eight goals, and also has three assists this year ... Junior Shannon Karl leads the team with seven assists, is tied for second with 19 points and fourth with six goals ... First team all-conference selection Anna Davis leads the CAA and is tied for fourth in the nation with seven defensive saves ... CAA Coach of the Year Peel Hawthorne is in her 18th season leading the Tribe ... A 1980 graduate of W&M, she was also named CAA Coach of the Year in 1995 and 2001 ... Hawthorne is the winningest field hockey coach in school history, with a 212-144-2 (.595) record in her career at the College.

Kelly Giles Named CAA Player of the Year
Junior Kelly Giles was named the CAA Player of the Year in a vote of the league's coaches ... The forward is the first W&M player in school history to be named the CAA's Player of the Year, and just the second Tribe player to be picked as any conference's player of the Year ... Cheryl Boehringer was named the South Atlantic Conference's Player of the year in 1990 ... Giles is third in the CAA with 34 points and 14 goals and leads the conference with five game-winning goals.

Peel Hawthorne Voted CAA Coach of the Year
Tribe mentor Peel Hawthorne was selected by her peers as the CAA Coach of the Year for the third time in her career ... Hawthorne led the Tribe to a 13-6 record in the regular season ... W&M finished first in the CAA with a perfect 7-0 conference record, the Tribe's first outright regular season league title in school history ... Hawthorne was also picked as the CAA Coach of the Year in 1995 and 2001.

Six W&M Players Earn CAA Honors
Six W&M players earned all-conference accolades, with two players on the league's first team, three on the second team and one on the all-rookie team ... Along with CAA Player of the Year Kelly Giles, junior defender Anna Davis was also named to the league's first team ... Senior forward Ginny Sutton, senior goalkeeper Heather Kibbee and junior defender Diana Esposito were picked to the conference's second team ... Freshman defender Laura Kastelic was named to the first-ever CAA All-Rookie team.

CAA Championship Comes to Williamsburg
By winning the regular season CAA title, the Tribe earned the right to host the 2004 CAA Championship ... W&M also hosted the CAA Tournament in 1993 and 1998 ... Williamsburg was home to the South Atlantic Conference Championship in 1987.

Tribe Finishes First in CAA
For the first time in school history, W&M won an outright regular season conference championship, posting a 7-0 league record ... The Tribe capped off its first-ever undefeated conference season with a 2-1 win over eight-time defending league champion Old Dominion ... It was the Green and Gold's first win over the Monarchs since 1980, ending a 32-game losing streak against their local rivals ... That game also extended the Tribe's streak of 14 straight regular season conference wins, a school record.

Tribe Looking for Third CAA Title of the Fall . . .
This weekend the Tribe will attempt to win its third CAA title of the fall ... Already, the College's men's and women's cross country team have won conference titles, the only two to be awarded by the league prior to this weekend ... W&M's women's soccer team will attempt to win its eighth CAA title in the last nine years this weekend in Richmond.

. . . and the 79th CAA Championship in School History
Entering the weekend, the Tribe has won 78 CAA titles since the league began in the 1983-84 season ... With 28 more titles than the next closest school (James Madison has 50), the Green and Gold has claimed 23.1 percent of the CAA titles awarded in all sports ... Even if none of its men's titles were counted, the Tribe would still lead the league in championships won, as W&M has taken 52 of the 159 (.327) women's championships ... The Tribe has won 134 conference titles in school history, including 48 Southern Conference championships, six ECAC Gymnastics titles and two Atlantic 10 Football Conference crowns.

Two Players Selected to NFHCA North/South Senior All-Star Game
Midfielder Kate Baird and forward Ginny Sutton were selected to compete in the NFHCA North/South Senior All-Star Game ... This will be the third time in the last four years that the Tribe has sent the maximum two players to compete for the South squad ... The all-star game will be played on Saturday, November 20 in Winston-Salem, NC, the day before the NCAA Final.

Spreading the Wealth
One of the keys to W&M's success this season has been a balanced scoring attack, with 14 different players having scored at least one point, including 12 different goal-scorers ... Only four players have scored more than two goals this season, led by CAA Player of the Year Kelly Giles with 14 goals, third-best in the conference ... Seven different players have scored a game-winning goal for the Green and Gold this season.

Overtime Unkind to Tribe
W&M has lost both of its overtime contests this season, falling in the second extra period to Rutgers and Princeton ... The Tribe has lost three consecutive overtime games, five of its last six, and, dating back to 1994, 15 of its last 21 ... W&M's season has come to an end with an overtime defeat in each of the last four seasons, with all but one of those coming in double overtime.

W&M Solid in Goal Again
Senior Heather Kibbee makes this the sixth consecutive season that a W&M goalkeeper has earned first or second team All-CAA honors ... She ended the regular season ranked fourth in the CAA with a 1.78 GAA, while facing one of the toughest schedules in the league ... Kibbee was recognized nationally for her abilities when she was named to the womensfieldhockey.com National Honor Roll on October 25 after totaling 13 saves in a pair of 2-1 wins over Virginia Commonwealth and James Madison ... Kibbee is the third different starting goalkeeper for W&M in the last three seasons, with Stacey Gaenzle guarding the cage for the Green and Gold last year and Claire Miller getting the call in 2001 and 2002.

Tribe FH Grads Coaching Around the Nation
W&M head coach Peel Hawthorne (1980) and assistant Kelly McQuade (2004) are just two of the many former Tribe field hockey players currently coaching the sport on the collegiate level ... Joanie Quinn Milhous (1991) is the head coach at Villanova ... Heidi Salin Godomsky (1991, Colby College), Mary Beth Noel (1999, California), Christine Paradis (1984, Amherst College), Jenn Rinella (1996, Temple), Jordan Steele (2003, Stanford), Erika Vargas (2000, Sacred Heart) and Julie Zoolkoski (2003, Amherst College) are also all assistants at the college level ... In addition, 1991 graduate Jenn Jones Goodrich is the executive director of the National Field Hockey Coaches Association (NFHCA).