Girls Lacrosse Head Coach Heidi Wall ’94 leads her team with experience and passion. Through meeting one-on-one with players and creating a detailed practice plan, Wall seeks to improve the team through individual connections and communication.
During her time at Andover, Wall was a tri-sport athlete at Andover. She went on to play Division III Lacrosse at Amherst College, where she received both academic and regional All-American honors and led her team to its first Eastern College Athletic Conference title (ECAC).
Wall said, “I started playing lacrosse here and I was a four year starter at Amherst. I broke the all time scoring record when I was there. I was a Captain in my Senior year, an All-American. The Amherst team won the ECAC championship twice when I was on the team, my junior and senior year. And I think my playing experience was really positive in such a way that I was really excited about being able to get back to the sport as a coach.”
Wall’s coaching technique relies on feedback from the team, according to Charley Drouin ’25. Through trial and error, Wall is able to find the best plays for the team dynamic.
“On the field she does a very good job of communicating her ideas, and her coaching style is probably one of my favorites. I would say just because she will set up new plays and she’ll try to see what works best for us. And really tries to get us all to help each other out to set the play to score or to get the ground ball or to ride on attack, which I really like. And she’ll pull individuals aside or a midfielder aside and she’ll tell us what she would think would work best,” said Drouin.
Regardless of the outcome, Wall remains optimistic and encourages the team with affirmative comments. Quiana Bell ’26 emphasized how her approach uplifts the team and sets them to continue to grow.
“Coach [Wall] focuses a lot on the positives of the situation. I think she really just wants to see our growth as a team rather than like how many wins or losses we have. And she’ll give us things to work on, but I feel like every single practice after every single game. She’ll always start off her emails or when she talks to us with, ‘This is what I think went really well. This is how you grew from like the last time we played.” And I actually think that helps boost our team’s confidence,” said Bell.
Through a “Buddy” system, Wall creates a supportive environment for the members of the team. She also sets up individual meetings with each player to reflect on their individual goals and progress.
“We’ve got the girls paired up with each other and thinking about supporting each other in their play [and] we’ve done a lot of goal setting. So I met with all the players to think about things that they wanted to be working on, ways that they could help contribute to the team’s success. So we’ve done a lot of reflecting on things that each of us individually could be doing in order to better the team,” said Wall.
Bell recalls her experience of goal-setting with Wall, where she was able to reflect and talk about ways to enhance her performance relative to the team.
“A couple of weeks ago, she had one-on-ones with all of us, which is something I’ve never really seen before with a coach. But she set up time to talk to us for 15 to 20 minutes each and just ask how we were feeling about the season, how we were feeling about each other, what we want to see from her as a coach… And I think that aspect just helps bring our team more together and become more cohesive because we all wanted the same goals,” said Bell.
In 2019, coaches from St. Paul’s, Phillips Exeter Academy (Exeter), Andover, and Lawrenceville came together and created the SEAL Cup in place for a Spring championship. Now, the SEAL Cup has been converted to the Prep Cup, with a total of eight teams. Wall hopes the Prep Cup can expand further in the future.
“As a group of coaches, we’re just looking to try to continue to celebrate our teams together through playing lacrosse. So it’s a way to build camaraderie.There will be college coaches there and our hope also is that eventually we can try to turn this into something bigger,” said Wall.
Wall admires the athleticism and creativity involved in the game of lacrosse and hopes to share her passion for the sport with her team.
“I always hope to try to instill a love of the game, share my love of the game with my players and my team. And it’s just so exciting to see how much lacrosse continues to grow and evolve as a sport… The players are able to do so much more, there’s just so much amazing athleticism displayed. And I just love the game. It’s such a game of speed and finesse and teamwork,” said Wall.
