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Lock Haven field hockey coach Pat Rudy (far right) poses with her team after winning the 2000 National Championship. Rudy earned her 600th career win last Friday.
When the Lock Haven University Lady Eagle field hockey team defeated Davidson 2-0 Friday night, it marked a milestone that most coaches can only dream of. With the 2-0 final, it marked the 600th win for Lock Haven University head field hockey coach Pat Rudy in her illustrious 41-year career.
"As the game was winding down, it was surreal," said Rudy. "I was so focused on the outcome of the game because it was a really tough game. I had a lot of people coming to the Rider game last week and I told them there is no guarantee that it is going to happen at that time. Now that it (the search for 600) is over, it has taken a lot of pressure off of me. Now we can concentrate on the next game in our season."
Rudy entered the 2018 season with 593 wins and with her team's seventh victory of the season, pushed her career mark to the magic number of 600. Rudy's 600 wins are the third most in NCAA field hockey history. Only two other coaches have reached or surpassed the 600-win mark in the sport prior to Rudy's achievement.
Coach Rudy's all-time record now stands at 600-219-21, an amazing winning percentage of 72.7 percent. The current season is Rudy's 23rd at LHU, her alma mater. 2018 is the 41st year of her illustrious coaching career as a college field hockey coach and her winning percentage ranks her among the top 25 all-time which is currently good enough for a Top Five ranking in terms of active head coaches.
Although feeling very fortunate to have reached the 600-win plateau, Rudy was quick to point out that it couldn't have happened without the help of outstanding student-athletes and assistant coaches.
"I have been fortunate to have had a lot of good athletes and assistant coaches in my career," said Rudy. "I was fortunate to have had two outstanding coaches in my playing career. One was my high school coach Julie Dixon who is a Lock Haven grad. She was a member of the US squad during her playing days and to me, she walked on water. She was the one who really influenced me to come to Lock Haven. Then of course playing for Sharon Taylor who was an outstanding coach and administrator was huge in my career. I was a freshman Sharon's first year of coaching and she certainly impacted my coaching career. Those two had a huge influence in my coaching career."
While a college athlete and in the early stages of her outstanding coaching career, LHU competed in the Division II level of the NCAA. In 2004 the move was made to compete in Division I with hopes of upgrading the program to a more competitive level. The 1996 season proved to be a great season for coach Rudy as she led the Bald Eagles to a 20-3 record in her first year on the job.
"I have coached at all three levels of NCAA competition and I actually coached before there were any divisions at all," said Rudy. "When I went to Illinois State, I was very young and working on my master's (degree). From there I went to SUNY-Cortland and that was a great place to coach. One of my biggest wins was when we (Cortland) beat Lock Haven when Sharon was coaching and for me, that was very memorable. When I came here in 1996 it was a Division II program and then we jumped up the ladder to Division I in 2004 so I have coached at all levels."
As for the jump to Division I, "it was an equity move," Rudy explained. "We had a Division I program (wrestling) on the men's side and it was only logical to have one (D-I program) on the women's side. Division II only had a few schools so the move gave women an opportunity to compete at a higher level. We were 19-1 in our first season competing in Division I which was the best record that year of any team in Division I field hockey."
The 2018 season marked the 73rd season for LHU field hockey. The Haven field hockey program has a storied past and rich history of pride, success and championships. LHU is home to seven National Championships and remarkably, Coach Rudy is just the third coach in program history joining Sharon Taylor and 2015 Charter LHU Athletics Hall of Fame Inductee Charlotte Smith as the leaders of one of the most successful collegiate programs in history.
"Now that I reached the 600-mark, I realize that I am one of only three," said Rudy. "One of them is Nancy Stevens (UConn) who was my high school teammate and we go way back and Karen Shelton is the head coach at North Carolina. She (Shelton) and Nancy were teammates and I played against both of them when they were teammates at West Chester so the three of us are kind of connected. They (Tarheels) are a top D-I team and that made me think about how difficult it is to get to 600 wins. Not only do you have to be coaching for a long time, but you have to be very successful as well. With the parity of the sport getting better and better, I think it is going to be much more difficult to reach that level."
Although Rudy has had many memorable moments in here 41-year coaching career, there were a few that might have stood out just a little more than the others.
"I think winning the first national championship was big," said Rudy. "Then we beat Iowa 4-0 here at home and a few years ago we beat Penn State and that was big for our program. Collectively we have defeated every team in the A-10 at least once so we are just trying to claw our way back to the (NCAA) tournament. Hopefully we can soon do that and then we'll see what happens."
So how much longer can we expect to see Coach Pat Rudy moving up and down the sidelines while coaching the very successful LHU program?
"Right now I am going game to game," said Rudy with a smile on her face. "I am not counting the days or anything like that, but I think I'll know when it is time (to retire). I still enjoy very much what I am doing and as long as I can enjoy it, I'll keep doing it."