Former Xaverian Brothers and Ursuline Academy varsity coach named interim head coach

EASTON, Mass. (February 24, 2020) – Stonehill College has announced that Lynne Smith will lead the women's tennis program following the retirement of head coach Pam Arpè. The announcement was made today by Dean O'Keefe, '94, Director of Athletics at Stonehill.

"We are excited to have Lynne Smith lead our women's tennis program," said O'Keefe. "She has enjoyed a highly successful high school coaching career and is ready to bring her mentorship to the collegiate level. We look forward to seeing her positive energy and background develop our student-athletes in their pursuit of academic and athletic excellence."

Smith comes to Stonehill after 16 years as a head coach in the region with Xaverian Brothers High School and Ursuline Academy. She is a United States Tennis Association (USTA) certified teaching professional, working with all ages and levels at the Brown Billone Tennis Club in Easton, having previously served in a similar role at Wimbledon 109 Tennis Club in Walpole.

"I am thrilled by the opportunity to work with the talented and successful student-athletes on the Stonehill women's tennis team," said Smith. "My goal is to help each of them achieve continued success on the courts and in the classroom. This will require the right balance of academic and athletic efforts in a challenging environment. I am grateful to retiring Coach Arpè and the College for having created an outstanding platform which I hope to maintain and enhance in the coming years."

Smith joins Stonehill after two years as varsity tennis coach at Xaverian Brothers, where she also oversaw the junior varsity and developed the middle school programs to improve their matriculation to the high school program. Prior to Xaverian, she served 12 years as varsity tennis coach at Ursuline, compiling a record of 175-40 (.814), and earning a pair of Boston Globe Girls' Tennis Coach of the Year honors. Smith guided Ursuline to a pair of Massachusetts South Sectional Championships in 2007 and 2014, falling in the State Semifinals in 2007. Ursuline posted a 20-3 record in 2013 and reached another South Sectional final. Smith also coached a varsity doubles team to the semifinals of the 2011 State Championship Individual Tournament.

Smith, inducted into the Barnstable High School Hall of Fame, is a 1984 graduate of Boston College, where she earned her Bachelor of Arts in political science. She was a member of the Eagles field hockey and women's ice hockey programs. Smith, whose daughter Avery is a member of the women's tennis team at Randolph Macon College in Virginia, resides in Walpole. She was a member of a USTA 4.0 women's tennis team that won the USTA National Championship in 2010 and has completed four marathons.

Stonehill, ranked No. 4 in the most recent Oracle/Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) Division II East Regional rankings, posted a 12-3 record overall during the fall season, including 9-1 in the NE10 to clinch a share of its tenth Northeast-10 Conference regular season championship. The Skyhawks captured their second-straight NE10 Tournament title, the seventh in program history overall, with a 5-1 win over Le Moyne College to claim an automatic bid for the NCAA Division II Tournament in May.

With 23 intercollegiate sports, after announcing the addition of women's swimming and ice hockey during the fall semester, Stonehill boasts one of the top athletic and academic programs in the country. Stonehill has won the Northeast-10 Conference Presidents' Cup five times, all coming within the last 14 years. The Skyhawks have received the NCAA Division II Presidents' Award for Academic Achievement each of the first nine years of the program's existence of honoring institutions with an Academic Success Rate (ASR) of 90-percent or better. Stonehill has earned a 95% Academic Success Ranking (ASR) by the NCAA, which considers the academic success rate of the institution based on the graduation rate of student-athletes, good for tenth among all NCAA Division II institutions, with nine Skyhawk teams receiving a perfect rating of 100%. Stonehill won five NE10 Championships during the 2018-19 academic year, with nine programs earning NCAA Division II Championship bids and the equestrian program capturing its tenth Intercollegiate Horse Show Association (IHSA) Zone 1, Region 4 championship.

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