Photo Courtesy of the Sports Information Department
Friday, February 18th, 2011 was a landmark day in the history of University of Tampa athletics. On this truly historic day, the new men’s lacrosse program officially breathed its first breath of life with the hiring of Rory Whipple.
“We stole him,” UT Athletic Director Larry Marfise commented in his opening introduction of Whipple. Indeed, Marfise did get a steal in the hiring of Whipple, who formerly coached for UT’s conference rival, the Florida Southern Moccasins.
Whipple, a former NY State Wrestling Champion, is the Division II all-time leader in wins for men’s lacrosse with an overall collegiate record of 228-174 in 28 seasons, with the last two seasons having been spent with the Moccasins. With the Moccasins, Whipple went 8-15 while building their program from scratch, which is exactly what he will be trying to do at UT.
When asked about leaving Florida Southern for UT, Whipple stated, “That was a sensitive subject. It was sad for me to leave Florida Southern. Florida Southern is a great school, it has a real strong program going, and this year has been real successful [for them]. I just felt that the University of Tampa, with all the high school programs, and great facilities would be a better fit for me…. I am really excited to be here. ”
Coach Whipple’s success seems to be no fluke. He has a system that works and it is not a system for the faint of heart.
“Lacrosse is an exciting sport, a spectator sport and something the students can rally behind. We want to play as fast as possible, get up and down the field, [get] lots of shots on goal, [make] lots of contact and we want to play a fast pace,” Whipple commented.
For any students that feel that they may be up to the task of playing this aggressive, up tempo style of play, there will be open tryouts this fall.
Whipple addressed the matter stating, “Come this fall, we will have open tryouts for all the new recruits and also the current players that are here now. We recruit the student athlete, students with strong character, [students that are] educated, disciplined and have a desire to win.”
Building a program is no easy task, hence the open tryouts, but Coach Whipple doesn’t want to wait until later to win. He already has a plan of attack for hitting the proverbial recruiting pavement.
“We want to compete at a high level the first year out,” the newest UT coach said. “We will start out here locally in Tampa, then we will reach throughout the state of Florida, and then we will head north to New England, New York, New Jersey and Baltimore. We got going [with recruiting] last week.”
With a clear vision, a plan in place, and proven track record, it appears that UT Athletic Director Marfise did quite literally, “Get a Steal”. It is now officially time for the UT Lacrosse program and Coach Whipple era to begin.
Charles Myer can be reached at charles.myer@spartans.ut.edu.
