men's track Coaches

Entering his 23rd season of overseeing the St. Lawrence University Cross-Country and Track and Field programs, Mike Howard will again serve as the head coach of the women's cross country team in 2011.

Howard, the Director of the Saints Cross-Country and Track & Field Programs, also oversees the Men's and Women's Track program and serves the university as an Associate Athletic Director in charge of all scheduling and NCAA compliance duties within the department. He guided the team to the Atlantic Regional title in 2010 and his squad climbed as high as No. 2 in the USTFCCCA national rankings.

Howard, a 1987 St. Lawrence graduate, who stepped out of the role as the Head Cross-Country coach after the fall of 2000, has won numerous Coach of the Year Awards including five United States Track & Field and Cross-Country Coaches Association NCAA Division III Cross Country Regional Coach of the Year honors, most recently in 2010. He has won 18 conference "Coach of the Year" honors during his tenure with the Cross-Country and Track & Field programs as well as earning the same honor in New York State for both sports several times.

Co-captain of the 1993 men's cross country team and a four-year runner for the Saints in cross country and indoor and outdoor track, John Newman enters his 11th season as head men's cross country coach and his fourth at the helm of the men's track and field program. 

John served as assistant cross country and track and field coach from 1994-95 until becoming the head coach in 2001.  He earned his Bachelor of Science degree in sports studies in the spring of 1994 and his Master's Degree in education in 2001. 

Newman has played a major role in the success of the men's cross country program which includes 17 straight conference titles and a streak of four straight New York State Collegiate Track Conference championships. The Saints, who won the NCAA Regional championship in 1997 and 2000, also posted the program's best finish at the NCAA Championship race in 2010, finishing third overall. Newman, a native of Canton, NY, has coached eight All-Americans and 11 individual conference champions in cross country and was the Liberty League Cross Country Coach of the Year six times (04, 05, 07, 08, 09, 10). 

In track and field, his teams have won three NYSCTC indoor championships, back-to-back ECAC Indoor Championships and two Liberty League indoor championships during his tenure. The Saint men's team has had three All Americas including a national champion during his tenure.

Kate Curran, a former Penn State cross country and track and field athlete, joined the Saint staff as head women's track and field coach and assistant cross country coach in the fall of 2008 and earned Liberty League Indoor Coach of the Year honors in her first season as a collegiate head coach. Her teams have had three top ten finishes in the Deb Vercauteren Program of the Year Award.

She is vice president of the New York State Collegiate Track Conference and is the Atlantic Regional representative to the NCAA Cross Country and Track and Field Committee.

Curran came to St. Lawrence from Susquehanna University where she served as an assistant coach. She holds a USATF Level 1 Coaching certification and was Gatorade Sport Camp Hydration Manager at the Penn State summer sports camps. She coached distance and mid-distance runners along with pole vaulters at Susquehanna and had two NCAA qualifiers in the vault in the 2006-07 season.

As a Penn State undergraduate, she was a member of the Nittany Lion cross country and track and field teams and was varsity cross country captain as a senior. She was a member of the 2004 Big Ten Champion women's track and field team and earned Penn State and Big Ten Scholar-Athlete awards and was the recipient of the Big Ten Sportsmanship Award in 2005.

Beresford "Ozzie" Brown, the 2008 NCAA decathlon and indoor long jump champion has joined the Saint track and field staff as an assistant coach.

Brown, a graduate of Moravian College, was also a two-time All America in the 55 hurdles and the 2008 USTCCCA Mideast Region male Indoor and Outdoor Track Athlete of the Year and Mideast Region Indoor Field Athlete of the Year. He was the Mideast Region Male Track and Male Field Athlete of the Year in 2007.

He joins the Saint staff after coaching at Gwynedd Mercy College and at Moravian where he coached the sprinters, jumpers and hurdlers.

Kathryn "Katie" Gernand joins the Saint track and field staff as an assisting coach after spending the 2009-10 academic year as a cross country and track and field assistant coach at her alma mater, DePauw University.

Gernand had an NCAA Track and Field Internship at DePauw in 2009-10 in addition to her coaching duties and coordinated the Division III Indoor Track and Field Championships. As an assistant coach she worked with sprinters and jumpers. Her coaching experience also includes a season as assistant girls basketball coach at Armstrong Township High School in Illinois.

She was a DePauw record holder in five events, competing in the 200, 400, 800, long and triple jumps. The MVP of the women's track team and the winner of the Coaches Award, she was a nine-time all conference athlete in track and field and was a provisional national qualifier in the Distance Medley Relay.

Deshaya Williams, a three-time All America thrower and the 2003 NCAA Division I women's discus champion while a student at Penn State, has joined the St. Lawrence University athletic staff as assistant track and field coach for men and women and assistant coordinator of student athlete development.

Williams, who spent last season as a track and field assistant at SUNY Fredonia, will coach the throws for the Saint men and women. A native of Saratoga Springs, she earned her bachelor's and master's degrees at Penn State in 2002 and 2004 and earned a second master's degree from the Erskine Theological Seminary in 2009. She served as a graduate assistant for the Penn State women's program and was a volunteer assistant at Clemson University from 2004-2006.

As an athlete, she participated in the US Olympic Trials in 2000 and 2004. She was a three-time Big Ten Champion, a member of the USA National Team and both USA Junior National Champion and Junior Pan American Champion in 1999. She was the first women's national champion in Penn State history when she won the discus title in 2003.

Dr. Matthew Skeels will serve as a Faculty/Staff Mentor to the men's track and field team in 2010-2011.

Education History:
B.S. - Potsdam State
Ph.D. - Clarkson University

Dr. Skeels is an Assistant Professor in the Chemistry Department at St. Lawrence University. He has taught a variety of classes including General Chemistry, Quantitative Analysis, Instrumental Analysis and Environmental Chemistry.

Phil Trivilino, the manager of network infrastructure for St. Lawrence University's Information Technology, will serve as a Faculty/Staff Mentor to the Men's Track and Field team in 2010-2011.

Phil has over 15 years of experience in the IT division at St. Lawrence University, including five years as a PC repair technician and three as a network technician. He now serves as the Manager of Network Infrastructure.

A very self-motivated individual, Phil believes in self education and utilizing specific learning opportunities as primary sources for technology skill development. Among his most important contributions to date, Phil has orchestrated a wireless network design and deployment for St. Lawrence. Utilizing Cisco hardware and Microsoft servers, a "zero configuration" guest access network and a "no software installs" secure authenticated network were implemented.