Sturdy as Stone: Coach Katey Stone's Impact on Women's Hockey
Twenty one years. That’s the average age of a college student but it is also the amount of time Katey Stone has been coaching the Harvard women’s ice hockey team.
The 2015-2016 season saw Stone line up behind the Crimson’s bench for the 21st year of her tenure, a period that encompasses more time than half of the players on Harvard’s roster have been alive.
Over the course of her career at Harvard, Stone has managed to achieve milestones that other women’s hockey coaches have not come close to eclipsing. Stone became the winningest coach in the history of Division I women’s college hockey during the 2009-10 season after defeating Princeton in the ECAC quarterfinal, tallying her 338th win.
Since then, the total has increased to 446–over 50 more than the closest coach. In addition to the victories, Stone has led the team to 11 Beanpot titles, eight Ivy championships, seven ECAC regular season titles, six ECAC tournament crowns, and 11 NCAA Tournament appearances–including six Frozen Four berths.
Stone has also obtained success in player development, helping various of her athletes reach a high level. The Watertown, Conn. native has coached 11 Olympians, 23 All-
Americans since 1999, six Patty Kazmaier Award winners—given to the top women’s college hockey player in the nation—and nine ECAC Players of the Year.
The success, in Stone’s opinion, is a testament to the intricate balance put together to compose the Harvard Women’s Hockey program, and finding a successful combination is much more fulfilling than her name at the top of a leaderboard.
“I don’t spend along time thinking about that [the wins record],” Stone said. “What I do believe, and it’s more of a reality statement than it is a hockey statement, that if you can win at Harvard, you can win anywhere because the academic standards are so high, and the demands on our kid and outside distractions like no other place. To have that level of commitment from our athletes and those that work within our department and our staff, really allows us to be successful. I think that’s what I’m most proud of, in seeing what our kids do on the international level and post graduation.”
For Stone, the transition from playing hockey to coaching had a quick turnaround. A graduate of the University of New Hampshire in 1989, Stone led the Wildcat hockey and lacrosse teams, both of which she was a captain and four-year letter winner, to great success in her four years, including a lacrosse national championship in 1985.
Coming out of college Stone turned immediately to coaching, serving on the athletic staff Tabor Academy before being hired by Harvard in 1994. Being handed a team that had trended toward the middle of the ECAC presented Stone with a challenge to try and revamp the Crimson in her first years behind the bench.
She was up for the challenge. In a five year span, Stone took a team that had barely finished above .500 in 1994 to a squad that racked up 33 wins during the 1998-1999 season.
That year Stone led her team to Harvard’s first and only national championship in women’s ice hockey, bringing the AWCHA National Championship back to Cambridge after defeating UNH in the final–the last of a string of 30 consecutive wins to close out the season.
Fast forward 15 years and Stone found her Crimson team in another national championship game, though she came to the ice under very different circumstances. Instead of the young, barely established face Stone had presented in 1999, Harvard’s leader had now become an experienced mentor to two decades of skaters.
Having returned to the team for the 2014-2015 season after taking the previous one off to coach the USA national team–which included four current or ex-Harvard players–to the silver medal at Sochi, Stone seemed to seamlessly slip back into her leadership role on the side of the ice, immediately taking her team to Beanpot and ECAC title, although the national championship alluded her this second time around.
However, the immediate success of her team following the return provided a testament to the program Stone had built in Cambridge.
“We had an incredible run and I think when you work for someone who is so established... it was not hard for the girls to know who is in change when Coach Stone came back,” said Maura Crowell, the current Minnesota-Duluth head coach and a former Harvard assistant coach who took over as head coach while Stone prepared for the Sochi games. “When she came back, I think that was a shot in the arm in a positive way—a shot of energy for everybody. And the proof was in the pudding. It was an incredible year—lots of championships along the way, lots of wins, and a lot of fun.
Stone has served as an anchor not only for the Crimson program, but for the sport of women’s college hockey as well. From the expansion of the team’s roster to the expansion to the ECAC conference, Stone has been there to see it all and watch the game transform before her eyes.
She has also been a major key in bringing the top athletes to Harvard, as the success she has maintained throughout the years has correlated with the talent recruited to join in on the ice.
“Knowing that she was the Harvard coach was definitely a big part of my decision,” said senior forward Michelle Picard, who Stone coached at Harvard as well as in Sochi. “She was known to be an amazing coach and she was a big part of the puzzle of what made Harvard great.”
Stone’s influence is not limited to her players, however. The coach’s prominence has allowed her philosophy and team first mentality to spread throughout women’s hockey, changing the way the game is approached by other coaches.
Crowell’s transition from Harvard assistant coach to head coach at Duluth has seen her embrace Stone’s methods, methods that have become commonplace in the hockey world.
“[Harvard’s] motto has long been “team first.” Now unfortunately everybody’s using “team first,” but it really did start with the Harvard women’s hockey team and that mentality.” Crowell said. “That culture is extremely powerful, and that’s certainly something that I believe in too, and I’ve been trying to create [at UMD].”
Despite amassing a resume most coaches can only dream of fulfilling in a career during her time leading the Crimson, Stone is not even close to thinking about putting a cap on her time coaching in Cambridge.
“I plan to coach for quite a few more years,” Stone said. “I haven’t thought about retirement…. If i stopped loving it I’d step away but I love it and the goals of the program are the same.”
While Stone’s impact has undoubtedly been felt by many both in and out of the college hockey world, the most important impact she hopes to pass down is the way she has gone conducting herself as a coach. Even with her success, Stone remains true to the roots that helped her ascend in the first place.
“My hope is that I have been a good example for how a female should conduct themselves in the coaching world, whether they be coaching ice hockey or another sport, in that they do it with integrity and professionalism.” Stone explained. “That’s my hope. That’s how I try everyday to conduct myself and I hope somehow that trickles over to others in the game.”
—Staff writer Ariel Smolik-Valles can be reached at ariel.smolik-valles@thecrimson.com.
—Staff writer Julio Fierro can be reached at julio.fierro@thecrimson.com.