At the beginning of the semester the Athletics Department announced that the Women’s and Men’s Lacrosse teams would be joining two new conferences for the 2026 season. The men would join the Peach Belt Conference and the women would join the Gulf South Conference. Reporter Issac Baker spoke with Coach Ashley Lawrence to find out more about what this means for the women’s team.
What does it mean for you and your team to be named the 1st woman’s lacrosse program from an HBCU to offi cially join the Gulf South Conference?
Coach Ashley Lawrence: It’s a historical piece, so anytime that there’s an HBCU program, it’s always adding to the history that’s there, because there’s only four female teams. And just being a player on the fi rst and the one and only team at Howard before everybody else came along to now being a coach of that… it adds good pressure to things.
But it’s also just an additional monumental step. The girls realize that it’s a historical piece that’s being made, and then just from the coaching aspect, it’s a lot of historical marks that I’m touching.
How do you think this impacts not only your program, but also the visibility of women’s sports at HBCUs more broadly?
Coach Ashley Lawrence: I think it just puts us on an additional platform. So there are a lot of women’s teams, a lot of HBCU teams that are already on platforms. But now we’re on a diff erent type of platform. With our conference being smaller, and being southern, it just puts us in another slot to be on a platform as far as just visibility. Also just minorities playing the sport in general is a big piece.
Was it your idea or was it the athletic department? Who came up with it?
Coach Ashley Lawrence: From my understanding, I think they may have reached out to AD Sykes, which triggered the conversation. There was one conference that really wanted us to come in. But I think this conference, from my understanding, you know, just kind of reached out to the AD, and then everything was pretty much formed from there.
What specific factors, such as leadership, team, culture, or community support, played the biggest role in making this possible?
Coach Ashley Lawrence: I think all of it did. I think the work and the eff ort that we’ve been doing since our fi rst season… the work that the girls are putting in, the way that we’re pushing the media. I think the diff erent angles, the HBCU Playday, which is the community piece that we do every year. All of those items, all of those things help with just the push of things. I mean, women’s sports is always a push and pull type of thing. But I think just the way the world is changing, it’s just making the sports that we play more visible. The non traditional sports are still behind, but there’s also a huge push on that. So we have from the D1 angle, they’re now competing on TV, just like the men are.
In your view as the head coach, and as a leader, why is this such an important step forward?
Coach Ashley Lawrence: I think it’s just a continuous thing. It’s just understanding that you have to push for what it is that you want. If you think something is important enough and the drive is important enough, it’s just staying consistent with it and just making sure that your voice is heard somewhere. It may take a little bit, but at some point, someone will listen, especially if it’s important enough, and it’s made important enough.
