New lacrosse, squash coaches named at Bard

Bard College’s athletic department has named two new head coaches for their men’s squash and women’s lacrosse teams.

Australia native Craig Thorpe-Clark, who takes over the squash team, has been coaching and officiating squash for decades. He was the head men’s squash coach at the University of Pennsylvania, where he led the Quakers to a Top 10 national ranking; he also coached the men’s and women’s teams at Vassar College; and, in the early 1990s, he was head coach of the U.S. Women’s National Team.

“Craig brings a wealth of experience to Bard and our squash program,” said Bard Director of Athletics Kris Hall in a college news release. “We have a brand-new facility, and now we have one of the most knowledgeable and respected coaches in the country. Our student-athletes will benefit from his leadership and experience.”

“I am delighted to be joining the Bard College Athletic Department,” Thorpe-Clark said in the news release. “I look forward to working with our student-athletes in a brand new facility at a great academic institution.”

As part of a renovation and expansion of the Stevenson Athletic Center two summers ago, Bard constructed four state-of-the-art squash courts with a mezzanine viewing area. It is considered one of the finest squash facilities in the Northeast.

Bard competes in the College Squash Association (CSA), which is the governing body for intercollegiate squash in the United States. Thorpe-Clark has been a CSA board member for years, serving as president of the CSA at one point, and treasurer at another.

Mary Kate Scardill, who takes over as Head Women’s Lacrosse Coach and Assistant Athletic Director, comes to Bard from Castleton State College, where she was the Head Women’s Lacrosse and Volleyball coach from 2011-2013.

She led the women’s lacrosse program to a pair of North Atlantic Conference Championships and back-to-back NCAA Tournament appearances in 2012 and 2013. In the two previous years, Scardillo was a graduate assistant women’s lacrosse coach at Castleton as the Spartans made consecutive appearances in the New England Women’s Lacrosse Alliance (NEWLA) Championship.

A native of Slingerlands, N.Y., Scardillo attended Academy of the Holy Names in Albany, where she was a three-sport student-athlete. She was an Albany Times-Union All-Star in lacrosse, volleyball and basketball, before heading to Rochester to attend Nazareth College.

“With our Liberty League affiliation, geographic location and national academic reputation,” Hall said in a news release, “all of the ingredients are in place for Coach Scardillo to identify women who will become impact scholar-athletes in women’s lacrosse on our campus.”

“I am very excited and thankful to Kris Hall and the entire search committee,” Scardillo said in the news release. “Through the recruitment of scholar-athletes who have the ability to excel in the classroom and on the lacrosse field, our goal is to develop and compete on a higher level in the Liberty League.”

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