Golden girls: CCHS lacrosse program marking 50 years

When the Acton-Carlisle High School girls lacrosse team first picked up sticks 50 years ago, the athletes played behind the football field and learned as they went along. 

Now, as the program celebrates its golden anniversary, the girls play a full competitive schedule, boasting a 9-2 record at press time as they approach their 50th anniversary game on May 26.

“When they said there would be a team,” says Sally Comeau, who played during its fledgling years, “Dad got us sticks and thought it might be something we would enjoy.”

In the beginning, Comeau says, the team didn’t have formal field lines and instead used a row of trees as a natural boundary. 

“It was such a good time,” she says. “Everybody was learning how to play. There was a lot of laughing. It was still fun, not highly competitive.” 

Coach Karen Kavanagh, who also coached Acton-Carlisle gymnastics in the 1970s, recruited a number of the gymnasts, including Comeau, to come out for lacrosse.

“Back then, you didn’t have to be married to one sport,” says Comeau.

“Miss Kavanagh had a background in coaching,” says Heidi Comeau Bruening, Sally’s younger sister. “It was a sign of the times. Women’s sports were taking off, and Title IX came through.”

Bruening excelled in soccer, basketball, and lacrosse. In 1979, The Boston Globe called her “the best girl athlete to grace the playing fields of Acton-Carlisle High School.” 

“Our sister Kim started at a young age, just playing catch with us,” says Bruening. “There were no formal leagues. If you had athletic talent, you just played.”  

Eventually, Kim followed her sisters onto the field and played with Bruening. Sally had graduated in 1978. When any combination of the Comeau sisters played and racked up points, it was known as “The Comeau Connection.”

“They could run forever,” Bruening says of her sisters. Lacrosse “favors those who have both endurance and quickness.”

The modern era

Forty years later, when the sport became more regulated and competitive and wooden sticks had long given way to plastic ones, sisters Payton and Fallon Vaughn played for Acton-Carlisle before heading to Yale University.  

“Playing with Payton was such a special experience,” Fallon says in a text. “I have always looked up to her, but being on the same team and being teammates instead of just sisters really strengthened our friendship, even though we were definitely each other’s harshest critic!” 

A senior at Yale, Fallon has been nominated for the Tewaaraton Award, bestowed on the nation’s best female college lacrosse player. Payton graduated from Yale and is a graduate student at the University of Denver, where she’s on the lacrosse team.

Erin Cash played at Boston College and started coaching the Patriots in 2019. She coached Fallon during her junior and senior years.

“Erin was an incredible role model and leader who not only elevated my game but also helped me grow into a more confident player and person,” Fallon says.

Shaping a life’s trajectory 

Jen Greeley, an English teacher at CCHS, played for Harvard College. Greeley coached Acton-Carlisle girls lacrosse from 1994 to 2002, with many of her players having distinguished collegiate careers.

Coaches “Jen Greeley and Donna Gilbert helped to shape my life’s trajectory,” says Emily Boynton Rush, who played at Brown University. “Jen became a mentor. She was fantastic; so was the whole program.”

Alison Furey Nowicki, chair of the Acton-Carlisle Guidance Department, played under Greeley. She also played for Williams College and coached Patriots girls lacrosse in the mid-2000s.

“In thinking about Jen and my coach at Williams, they were hard on us, but they were not mean,” Nowicki says. “There was no screaming when there was a loss. It was, ‘What can we take out of this? How can we turn it around?’ They also had fun with us.”   

Playing it forward

“Lacrosse in Acton is a deeply rooted sport,” Cash says. “A lot of the parents played. They might have had siblings who played.” 

The Feloneys are a lacrosse family. Sarah Kanner Feloney played for Acton-Carlisle in the mid-1990s and continued at Union College. She is mother to two daughters, a freshman and a junior, on the current varsity squad.

“Watching my daughters play in the sport they love, surrounded by talented, driven, and fun teammates, is extremely special,” Feloney says.

CCHS will play its 50th anniversary game at 11 a.m. on Monday, May 26.