CHAMPIONSHIPS (1): 2022

NATIONAL TOURNAMENT APPEARANCES (1): 2022

COACH OF THE YEAR (1): 2023

CAREER RECORD: 46-8 (.852)

The first full-time women’s lacrosse coach in Saint Joseph’s history, David Keenan focuses on recruiting players who fit within the culture he has championed since his earliest days as a coach.

Coach Keenan has found success curating a team of strong and serious students who happen to be passionate about playing lacrosse. Most importantly, they buy into the team’s expectations and values, and are willing to provide support and encouragement to their teammates. The result of this proven formula is a team that loves to both play and spend time together, helping cement bonds that pay dividends on and off the field.

In addition to his regular full-time coaching duties at Saint Joseph’s, Keenan is heavily involved in his home and college communities, as he volunteers his time coaching at clinics and programs run by USA Lacrosse, universities, and club programs and serves as a coach at Wicked Lacrosse.

RECENTLY:

Coach Keenan brought the Saint Joseph’s women’s lacrosse program to new heights in his first full season at the helm after overseeing the team during pandemic-shortened campaigns in 2020 and 2021.

Under Keenan's watch in 2022, the Monks posted a 20-1 record with a perfect 13-0 mark in Great Northeast Athletic Conference (GNAC) play. As the top seed in the GNAC Tournament, St. Joe's toppled Elms College, 20-4, in quarterfinal play and advanced to the conference championship game with a 12-7 triumph over Emmanuel College in semifinal action.

Hosting second-seeded – and four-time defending GNAC champion - Johnson & Wales University in the title bout, Saint Joseph's trailed for the better part of the contest but clinched the crown with three unanswered goals in the fourth quarter, winning 10-9.

Making their second NCAA Tournament appearance and first since 2015, the Monks faced #23 SUNY-Geneseo in the opening round and suffered a 19-2 defeat at the hands of the Knights.

The 2022 Monks established numerous team records, including wins (20), points (510), shots (744), shots on goal (571), free-position goals (60), draw controls (330), and man-up goals (26), and several players broke longstanding individual season marks and garnered postseason accolades for their efforts.

Grad student Lydia Dexter (Oakland, Maine) established new SJC records for goals (80), assists (75), points (155), points per game (7.38), and assists per game (3.57). She also shattered the GNAC single-season points record (previously 130 points) and became the Monks' career assists (115) leader during the 2022 campaign. Following the season’s completion, Dexter was named as the GNAC Offensive Player of the Year and claimed First-Team All-Conference and Second-Team All-Region honors.

Sophomore Carson Battaglia (Gorham, Maine) earned First Team All-Conference and GNAC Midfielder of the Year accolades after netting 40 goals with seven assists, 43 ground balls, 136 draw controls and 14 caused turnovers. Her 2022 draw controls total led the conference and shattered the program's single-season record – previously held by Anneka Adame '14 who tallied 113 DC’s in 2013.

Sophomores Bridget Collins (Milford, Conn.) and Erica Irvin (Windham, N.H.) collected Second Team All-Conference accolades and junior Tara Powers (Tyngsboro, Mass.) and sophomores Cailyn Wesley (Peabody, Mass.) and Madison Scott (Cumberland, Maine) earned Third Team acclaim.

PRIOR SEASONS:

2021: The 2021 campaign was off to a similar start as Saint Joseph’s held a 6-2 record – including a 2-1 mark in GNAC play – when the pandemic forced the college to send students home in late April. The Monks’ two losses came at the hands of quality opponents – NESCAC foe Bates College and reigning GNAC Champion Johnson & Wales (12-11 in OT) – as the team looked poised to make a lengthy playoff run. Six players collected All-Conference honors, as attack Lydia Dexter (Oakland, Maine) was a First Team honoree and freshman defender Erica Irvin (Windham, N.H.) was listed on the Second Team while senior midfielder Josie Ring (Newfield, Maine) and freshmen midi's Carson Battaglia (Gorham, Maine), Megan Mourmouras (Biddeford, Maine), and Cailyn Wesley (Peabody, Mass.) claimed Third Team All-GNAC honors.

2020: In his first year as the Monks’ clipboard carrier, Keenan led the Royal Blue to a 4-1 record with wins over Husson, Maine Maritime, Southern Maine, and UMaine-Farmington before the Covid-19 pandemic began. The abrupt end of the season ended the college careers of four seniors, including Maddy Beaulieu (West Gardiner, Maine) who tallied 27 points (8G – 19A) in just five games.

PREVIOUSLY:

Keenan, who joined the women's lacrosse program as an assistant coach in the fall of 2018, has an impressive background - both playing and coaching - in the sport of lacrosse.

Keenan was instrumental in bringing girls’ lacrosse to the Lakes Region, where he began with a small youth team, eventually building and running a full, thriving lacrosse program that served local girls from 3rd through 12th grade. In 2018, just the fourth year of his Lake Region High School Girls’ Varsity program, his team won their first State Championship.

PERSONAL:

A Long Island native, Keenan was an All-American goalie at Bethpage HS and went on to earn a scholarship to play DI Lacrosse at North Carolina State University. After graduating with a degree in Agricultural Economics, he was drawn to Naples, Maine, where he started a successful small business which he owns to this day.

Keenan lives in Naples, Maine with his wife and two daughters.

CAREER RECORD: