Katherine Athens

Athens was named the assistant women’s lacrosse coach at Berry College in August of 2019. Athens joins the Berry women's lacrosse team after serving two years as the assistant lacrosse coach at Division I, Saint Francis University in Pennsylvania.

At Saint Francis Athens served as the defensive coordinator and goalie coach. During those two years, Saint Francis had the two best seasons in the program’s history. In the 2018 season, for the first time in program history, Saint Francis had a defender receive All-Conference honors. This player repeated as an All-Conference player in 2019 and in both years, she led the Northeast Conference (NEC) in ground balls and caused turnovers. Athens’ starting goalie led the conference in saves per game for these same two consecutive seasons. At St. Francis, Athens was instrumental in assisting the head coach with the recruiting process, player leadership development, scouting and preparing for opponents, making game day adjustments, travel planning and administration, and alumni relations.

Athens began her coaching career with a three-year stint at Messiah College, one of the premier teams in NCAA Division III. The Falcons won three conference championships in three seasons. Messiah was ranked No. 4 in NCAA Division III at the end of the 2017 regular season.

While at Messiah, Athens developed 14 all-region players, two conference Defensive Players of the Year, and goalie Alex Dipeso into a two-time All-American. She was nominated for the IWLCA Division III Assistant Coach of the Year in 2016.

As a player, Athens was a four-year starter, three-time team captain and three-time NCAA All-American at Division II, Pfeiffer University in North Carolina. She was named the Conference Carolinas Defensive Player of the Year in 2013 and 2014, leading the Falcons to its first two NCAA Tournament appearances in school history.

Athens, an accounting major and business minor, was a four-time All-Academic Team member and a four-time Pfeiffer Scholar-Athlete Award winner. She went on to earn a Masters of Arts degree in Education from Messiah in 2016.