Field Hockey | February 4, 2015

PHILADELPHIA – La Salle celebrated National Girls and Women in Sports Day On February 3 with a luncheon in the Union Ballroom. The keynote speaker, Kathy McNally, received the Mary O'Connor Award for her contrbutions to women's athletics at La Salle University. 

The event was well attended, including many members of the 1980 AIAW National Championship field hockey team. Current La Salle student-athletes, elementary school students from Logan Elementary School, alumni and staff were also in attendance. 

NGWSD began in 1987 as a day to remember Olympic volleyball player, Flo Hyman, for her athletic achievements and her promoting equality for women's sports.  Since that time, NGWSD has become a day to acknowledge the past accomplishments of female athletes, recognize current sports achievements, the positive influence of sports participation, and the continuing struggle for equality and access for women in sports. 

McNally spent 22 years at 20th and Olney. She was hired by then-women's athletics coordinator Mary O'Connor in 1976 as the head field hockey coach, and then succeeded O'Connor upon her passing in 1977 as the Assistant Athletic Director/Coordinator of Women's Athletics.
 
She spent four seasons on the field hockey sidelines from 1976-79 and compiled a program record .679 win percentage and 43-18-9 record. Her 1976 squad went 5-6-2, a marked improvement over the 2-9 record the year prior to her arrival. Her 1977 squad doubled that win total, going 10-5-1. La Salle field hockey reached new heights in 1978, going 13-2-2 overall and reaching the AIAW playoffs. In 1979, the squad advanced to the AIAW national championship tournament and went 4-1 in the tournament to place fifth in the nation.
 
McNally relinquished her field hockey duties after the 1979 season to concentrate full time on her expanding administrative duties, which included overseeing La Salle's eight women's varsity sports. One of her first responsibilities at that point was hiring Joan Broderick to take over the field hockey program. Between her hiring of Broderick and the strides the team made in her four years on the sidelines, she set the program up for its greatest achievement in program history – winning the 1980 national championship title.
 
By the time she left La Salle, she was helping direct administrative and operational aspects of all 24 varsity sports. She was hired in January 1998 as the first female athletic director at Gannon University in Erie, Pa., and later moved on to the University of Hawaii-Hilo as its first female athletic director.