NEW HAVEN, Conn. – Five games against teams that made the NCAA Tournament – including a rematch of last year's quarterfinal game vs. Syracuse – highlight the 2025 schedule for the Yale women's lacrosse team. The schedule was announced Monday, with the season opener set for Feb. 15 vs. Michigan at Reese Stadium. This season the Bulldogs will celebrate 50 years of Yale women's lacrosse.
The 15-game slate includes seven Ivy League games and eight non-league games. The Ivy League women's lacrosse tournament, in which the top four teams in the regular season standings compete for the league's automatic berth in the NCAA Tournament, takes place May 2 and May 4 at the site of the No. 1 seed.
The Bulldogs aim to build on last year's accomplishments, which included winning a pair of games in the NCAA Tournament and advancing to the NCAA Quarterfinals. They won the Ivy League Tournament for the first time in school history and secured the first outright Ivy League Championship for the regular season in program history (Yale shared the Ivy title in 1980 and 2003). The team went 7-0 in Ivy play for the first time, and the Bulldogs' 17 overall wins were a school record. Yale was ranked No. 6 in the final 2024 ILWomen/IWLCA national poll.
Yale returns 30 players from the 2024 season for 2025, including 10 who started 15 or more games. The Bulldogs' captain is senior midfielder
Sophie Straka (Chatham, N.J.).
This is Yale's 10th year under
Erica Bamford, Yale's Joel E. Smilow, Class of 1954 Head Coach of Women's Lacrosse. Assistant coaches
Molly Palella and
Colleen Smith are back for their eighth and ninth years, respectively.
Brooklyn Neumen has joined the staff as an assistant coach.
Here is a breakdown of the schedule:
The Basics
- Yale's regular-season schedule consists of 15 games.
- That includes seven games against Ivy League opponents (Brown, Columbia, Cornell, Dartmouth, Harvard, Penn and Princeton).
- In addition to the Ivy League, Yale plays games against teams from six other conferences:
- America East Conference (UMass Lowell)
- Atlantic Coast Conference (Stanford, Syracuse)
- Big East Conference (UConn)
- Big Ten Conference (Michigan, Rutgers)
- Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference (Quinnipiac)
- Northeast Conference (Central Connecticut State)
- There are eight regular-season road games and seven regular-season home games.
- Yale plays games in six different states (California, Connecticut, Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island).
Strength of Schedule
- Yale plays seven games against teams that were ranked or receiving votes in the final 2024 IWLCA national poll (No. 3 Syracuse, No. 5 Michigan, No. 7 Penn, No. 15 Princeton, No. 17 Stanford, RV Brown, RV Harvard). Yale was No. 6 in the final poll.
- The schedule includes five games against teams that played in the 2024 NCAA Tournament:
- Syracuse advanced to the semifinals before losing to eventual national champion BC.
- Michigan advanced to the quarterfinals before losing to eventual national champion BC.
- Princeton advanced to the second round before losing to eventual national champion BC.
- Penn advanced to the second round before losing to eventual national runners-up Northwestern.
- Stanford lost in the first round to Denver.
Dates to Celebrate
- On Saturday Mar. 29 vs. Princeton Yale will celebrate 50 years of Yale women's lacrosse.
- On Saturday Apr. 26 vs. Cornell Yale will host Senior Day, as the Bulldogs pay tribute to the members of the Class of 2025:
- Goalkeeper Caitlin Brown (Mount Kisco, N.Y.)
- Midfielder Caroline Burt (Newtown Square, Pa.)
- Attacker Charlotte Callahan (Hinsdale, Ill.)
- Midfielder Sky Carrasquillo (Alpharetta, Ga.)
- Attacker Jenna Collignon (Hinsdale, Ill.)
- Attacker Shannon Dahlquist (Darien, Conn.)
- Goalkeeper Cami Donadio (Winter Park, Fla.)
- Attacker Taylor Everson (Montclair, N.J.)
- Defender Becca Gill (Weston, Mass.)
- Midfielder Alex Hopkins (Garden City, N.Y.)
- Midfielder Taylor Lane (Norwalk, Conn.)
- Attacker Meghan McCarthy (Potomac, Md.)
- Defender Molly McGuckin (Alexandria, Va.)
- Midfielder Sophie Straka (Chatham, N.J.)
- Defender Lyssa Tyler (Longmeadow, Mass.)
- Midfielder Fallon Vaughn (Concord, Mass.)
Postseason
- The top four teams in the Ivy League regular season standings will take part in the Ivy League Tournament, which determines the team that receives the league's automatic berth in the NCAA Tournament. The No 1 seed hosts the tournament. The semifinals are on Friday May 2 (No. 3 vs. No. 2 and No. 4 vs. No. 1). The championship game takes place on Sunday May 4.
- The NCAA Tournament includes 29 teams. Fifteen conference champions qualify automatically; the balance of the field is selected at-large by the NCAA Division I Women's Lacrosse Committee. The top eight teams in the 29 team bracket are seeded. The top three teams receive first-round byes.
- Selections for the NCAA tournament will be announced on Sunday May 4 on ESPN2.
- The first round (May 9), second round (May 11) and quarterfinals (May 15) take place at non-predetermined campus sites.
- The semifinals (May 23) and championship (May 25) take place at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Mass., and are hosted by Harvard.
Game Coverage
- Live video of home games and select road games is scheduled to be available on ESPN+.
- International viewers will be able to watch home games and select road games via Stretch Internet.
- Links to live stats for all games will be posted on the schedule page of yalebulldogs.com.
- The schedule is subject to change. Check yalebulldogs.com for updates.
