The 2024 Boothbay Region High School field hockey team will be coached by two former outstanding high school field hockey players who both played at the collegiate level.

Jacqueline “Jax” van der Veen has taken over the head coaching job after Skyler Davis, who coached the Seahawks for two seasons, decided not to return due to a busy year as a local teacher.

Van der Veen played three seasons for Division 1 Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. (missing her senior year due to the COVID-19 pandemic). She graduated from GU in 2022.

Serving as Jax’s assistant and junior varsity coach is Taylor Walby, a 2015 BRHS graduate and a 2019 graduate of Division III Lasell College (now Lasell University) in Newton, Massachusetts. Walby played two seasons for the Lasell Lasers.

So how did this new coaching regime come about?

“It was actually Taylor who recruited me for the head coaching job,” said van der Veen, who also manages Carousel Marina. Walby is employed in the marina’s restaurant, Whale’s Tale.

“Skyler told me this summer she wouldn’t be returning to coach,” said Taylor, “I then recruited Jax and I got a lot of help from her mother to convince her to do it.”

“She (Taylor) was very persistent,” said Jax with a laugh.

Both van der Veen and Walby, as of Aug. 28, have had about eight days of pre-season practices with the players, who numbered 18 at the morning practice on Aug. 28.

The coaches said they have a great group of strong players.

“They are buying into what xwe are trying to do, stressing to ‘be it,’ not questioning ‘why’ but giving them the reasons for the running and stretching, that we are not penalizing them but trying to improve them as athletes,” said van der Veen, a former outstanding and award-winning junior sailor with Boothbay Harbor Yacht Club. “They have been adaptable with the turning of a new page.”

“We knew we had to find a goalie with Cass gone.” (Amaral, a sophomore last year, now attends  Morse High School). “We have been lucky – as it is a tough position to fill – by having three girls vying for the position,” said Walby, a former all-state player and BRHS most valuable player in 2014.

The Seahawks have five seniors, Abbie Clark, Magen Burge, Ivory Cody, Bailey Lewis and Lily Nein. Nein is recovering from a broken arm and said she hopes to get back on the field soon with an anticipated return in late September.

Nein said the coaches are teaching them things that are new “but they are dedicated and know the skills we need to learn.”

Van der Veen, who played center mid in college, said Clark will be in that position this season.

“It’s comparable to the quarterback position in football; the go-to player on the field. Abbie has filled that role very well so far,” said van der Veen. “They (seniors) are a special group and are an extension of us (coaches).”

The team has a lot of experience, too, in the junior class, which includes Rose Campbell, Tatum French, Abby Orchard, Ella Watts and Sophie White.

Although the team has no sophomores, a talented group of freshmen will see a lot of playing time, said van der Veen. Those freshmen are Izzy Andreason, Olivia Carlson, Natalie Flagg, Arabella Hodgdon, Jessica Raburn, Allie Smart, Moriah Smith and Zuri Smith.

After losing seven seniors from last year’s team, the “new look” Seahawks will be trying to write their own chapter in Seahawk history. Boothbay finished 3-11 in 2023, finishing ninth in Class C South.

The Seahawks open the season at Oak Hill in Wales on Friday, Sept. 6. Their first home game will be Wednesday, Sept. 11 at 4 p.m. against Spruce Mountain, which finished 13-1 last season and lost in the regional final to Winthrop. Winthrop, the defending state champions, will host the Seahawks on Monday, Sept. 16.