Ted Spencer is in his 13th season as the head coach of the
Fairfield University men’s lacrosse program. Under his
tutelage the Stags have seen unprecedented success and continue to
make strides towards becoming a perennial contender at the national
level.
The second longest tenured male coach in the Fairfield Athletic
Department, Spencer has posted an 89-81 (.524) record. He has
led the Stags to two NCAA Tournaments, two ECAC Championships,
three MAAC Titles and two GWLL crowns. Across the three
leagues that Spencer has coached the Stags in, he has posted a
47-22 (.681) record.
Fairfield’s 2007 season got off to a rousing start, as the
team opened 5-0, and earned a number 12 national ranking, March 19,
the highest in program history. The Stags played several
highly-ranked teams, including hosting and defeating 11th ranked
Bucknell. For the third straight year, Greg Downing earned
All-America Honorable Mention honors, as well as joining classmate
Mike Bocklet among the elite in program history in offensive
production.
The 2006 campaign marked the Stags first as a member of the ECAC
Lacrosse League. Fairfield wasted little time in making its
presence felt, defeating Rutgers 11-7 in Piscataway, N.J., in the
program’s first-ever ECAC contest. The Stags upset
nationally ranked Loyola, nearly dealt a loss to national runner-up
UMass, and finished with a 4-3 record in league play.
Spencer’s 10th season at the helm, 2005, will go down as one
of the finest in program history. The Stags posted an 11-5
record on their way to winning a second Great West Lacrosse League
(GWLL) crown. Along with its second NCAA Tournament berth,
the Stags set a school record in total wins (11) and consecutive
wins (7).
That 2005 campaign earned Spencer his third Coach of the Year
honor. He was named the 2002 GWLL Coach of the Year, and
earned MAAC Coach of the Year accolades his first season
(1996). The 2002 coaching accolades were secondary to the
team’s accomplishments that season, winning the GWLL crown in
just their second campaign, and earning the program’s first
NCAA Tournament berth.
That first season, the fourth of the program’s varsity
history, saw Spencer lead the Stags to a school record nine wins,
including a perfect 7-0 conference mark. The nine-win season was
just a start for the Spencer coached Stags. Since then he has
led teams past that win total four times, with 11 wins in 1998 and
2005, and 10 win seasons in 1997 and 1999.
Spencer led his team to three consecutive Metro Atlantic Athletic
Conference (MAAC) championships from 1996 to 1998. The Stags
lost just two games in four seasons, going 28-2 in MAAC
regular-season play, including three undefeated seasons. Add
to that a pair of wins over MAAC foes in the 1999 ECAC Tournament,
and the Stags were 30-2 (.938) all-time against league opponents
while playing in the MAAC.
Under Spencer's guidance, Fairfield also earned four consecutive
postseason bids to the ECAC Tournament between 1996 and 1999, with
the Stags knocking off Colgate for the 1998 title and Mount St.
Mary's for the 1999 crown.
Spencer's players have garnered three All-American Honorable
Mention selections, three All-ECAC selections, two GWLL Newcomer of
the Year awards, one GWLL Player of the Year award, one GWLL
Offensive Player of the Year award, 20 All-GWLL selections, 21
All-New England selections, 14 USILA North/South All-Star
selections, 19 All-MAAC team members, three MAAC Player of the Year
awards, nine MAAC All-Academic and eight Academic All-New England
selections. In 2002, the Stags were selected as the winner of the
Joseph (Frenchy) Julien Memorial Award for Sportsmanship.
In 2001, a panel of Division I head coaches selected Spencer to
coach the prestigious USILA North/South All-Star game which
showcases the country's top Division I seniors. Major League
Lacrosse also honored him for being among a select few to have made
significant contributions to the development of lacrosse in
Connecticut.
Prior to his time at Fairfield, Spencer held assistant coaching
positions at Brown and Yale. He played for UMass-Amherst, where he
stood out as a long-pole defensive midfielder before graduating in
1985.
Spencer resides in Fairfield, Conn., with his wife, Denise, and
their children, Ryan-Elizabeth (13), Ben (11), and Devin (9).
