Red Dragon Coach to Lead Iroquois National Team

07/31/2013 

SUNY Cortland men’s lacrosse coach Steve Beville has been named the head coach of the Iroquois Nationals men’s lacrosse team that will be competing in the 2014 Federation of International Lacrosse (FIL) World Championships in Denver. The event, scheduled for July 10-19 next summer, is run by U.S. Lacrosse and is expected to be the largest international lacrosse event in history with as many as 40 nations represented.

Beville recently served as an assistant coach on the 2012 Iroquois Nationals U19 (under-19) squad that won a bronze medal at the World Championships in Finland. During that tournament, the team upset Team USA for its first-ever win versus an American team in international competition.

“This is a great honor for me to be chosen to lead the Iroquois men’s team for the 2014 championships,” Beville said. “I can’t imagine a better way to honor and give something back to the Iroquois people and the founders of this great game. We believe this team will be able to compete with the best in the world and be very successful.”

Beville’s assistant coaches will be University of Virginia associate head coach Marc Van Arsdale, a Geneva, N.Y., native and 1985 Hobart College graduate, and Penn State University assistant coach Chris Doctor, a Skaneateles, N.Y., native and 2007 Rutgers University alumnus.

In seven seasons at Cortland, Beville has led the Red Dragons to a combined 125-18 (.874) record and seven NCAA Div. III tournament appearances. Cortland won the national title in 2009 and finished as national runner-up in 2007, 2008 and 2012. He was selected as the 2009 United States Intercollegiate Lacrosse Association (USILA) Division III National Coach of the Year and has been named State University of New York Athletic Conference (SUNYAC) Coach of the Year three times (2008, 2010, 2012).

A native of Syracuse, N.Y., Beville graduated from West Genesee High School in 1981. He was a two-time Div. III National Defenseman of the Year and played in three national championship games at Washington College in Maryland. Beville coached at Colorado College (1989-98) and the University of Vermont (1999-2006) prior to his arrival at Cortland.