Boston College Women's Lacrosse Received a $2.5 Million Gift-What It Means for Program

Two national championships since 2021. Eight straight trips to the NCAA Division 1 Women’s Lacrosse Final Four. It is safe to say that Boston College women’s lacrosse head coach Acacia Walker-Weinstein is far and away the most successful head coach of any current Boston College Athletics program.

Walker-Weinstein’s success in the realm of women’s lacrosse is not going unnoticed, either—by the lacrosse world, BC students, faculty, and, most importantly, alumni.

On Thursday, Boston College received a $2.5 million gift from Phil Schiller (‘82) and Kim Gassett-Schiller (parent ‘24) to endow the head coaching position for the BC women’s lacrosse program.

Endowing a head coach position in any sport is a monumental step within a college athletics program. But for a lacrosse coaching seat to be endowed by that amount—it’s almost unheard of. For that position to be on the women’s side—it’s actually one of just a few.

According to a release on BCEagles.com, the Schiller Family Head Coach for Women’s Lacrosse position is the third women’s head coaching endowment in BC Athletics history. Walker-Weinstein will be the first to hold the position in women’s lacrosse.

“I am honored to be named the Schiller Family Head Coach for Women’s Lacrosse and am excited to formally thank the Schillers for their gift to our program,” Walker-Weinstein said in the release. “The sustained support for the women’s lacrosse program will be instrumental for us to continue to succeed at the highest level. Thank you so much for believing in us.”

This is not the first time the Schiller family donated to the school in extremely generous sums. 

In 2012, the Schillers made a $5 million donation which endowed the head men’s hockey coaching position which, at the time, was the largest gift to a BC Athletics team and was the first coaching endowment at any Hockey East institution.

The Schillers have also endowed scholarships for the men’s and women’s ice hockey teams.

In 2017, the Schillers pledged $25 million for Boston College’s Institute for Integrated Science and Society, which is now a flourishing asset of the University and continuing to grow year by year with a focus on energy, health, and the environment through the field of engineering. 

The Schillers are annual supporters of financial aid through “Boston College Pops on the Heights: the Barbara and Jim Clearly Scholarship Gala,” and are also co-chairs of “Soaring Higher: the Campaign for Boston College,” which is BC’s $3 billion comprehensive fundraising campaign.

Their most recent gift to the University is a testament to the tireless efforts of Walker-Weinstein and her staff, from recruiting at a high level and dominating the sport to building a lasting culture in the program ranks.

It speaks volumes about what Walker-Weinstein is doing for women’s sports at the University and beyond—due to Title IX, BC only fosters a women’s lacrosse program and not a men’s, as the University sponsors a Division I baseball program for the Spring instead.

Only two other Universities in the country, Princeton and Dartmouth, have endowed head coaching positions in women’s lacrosse, making BC the first University to have its women’s lacrosse head coaching position endowed outside of the Ivy League.

That is what 158 wins since 2017—the most wins by any Division I program in the country—and producing three Tewaaraton Award winners, as well as over 40 All-American honorees, can do.

The Schillers’ endowment does not just function as a resource for Walker-Weinstein solely by any means. It acts for the program in its entirety, from assistant coaches to player initiatives, better accommodations on the road, and for situating the sport of women’s lacrosse in a more advanced position than it was ever before.

The achievements of Walker-Weinstein are historic, and she will go down as one of the greatest coaches in BC athletics history. With the endowment, however, Walker-Weinstein’s grip on the sport of lacrosse—and the landscape it encompasses—has forever changed.