'Home' at UMass, Ava Connaughton Elevating the Minutewomen

About 90 miles separate Westwood, Mass., and Amherst — the home of UMass’ flagship campus.

It’s a trek Ava Connaughton grew remarkably familiar with as she watched her older sister Haley Connaughton play for the Minutewomen. Former UMass attacker Fiona McGowan, who set the program’s single-season assist record in 2024, took that same journey from Westwood High School to Atlantic 10 stardom.

“UMass has always been home to me,” said Connaughton, now a sophomore attacker for the Minutewomen. “Just coming to my sister’s games, I always knew this was the place for me. My family means the world to me, and to allow them to come to every home game is really important to me.”

With an elevated role in 2025, Connaughton has helped the UMass attack pick up where graduated leading scorer McGowan left off. After securing a spot on the Atlantic 10 All-Rookie Team last season, the sophomore has scored 27 goals and dished out 22 assists in 12 starts.

Connaughton said she learned countless lessons in preparation from watching McGowan’s final collegiate season up close. Now, she consistently turns on her fellow Westwood product’s tape to look for aspects of McGowan’s game to emulate.

“She just got the job done, did the work [and] never complained,” Connaughton said. “That’s really the player I want to be. She mastered being at the crease, and because she knew her spot so well, she was able to talk people through their positions and through their goals. I want to get to that point where I master my spot, too.”

For UMass coach Jana Drummond, whose tenure in Amherst has overlapped both Connaughton sisters’ collegiate careers, the younger attacker displays many traits that consistently shone through with her older sister.

But Drummond said the sophomore continues to carve out her own legacy.

“With Ava, she’s making her own mark while also loving her sister, using her as a mentor,” Drummond said. “Ava’s here now like, ‘This is what I want to do. This is how I want to shape lacrosse.’ You’re seeing a bit of a different creativity from her. She has really found her way well and has put a lot of work in off the field to connect with her teammates.”

This past Saturday, the Minutewomen took on a Richmond squad that ended their 2024 campaign in the Atlantic 10 tournament.

While Drummond said every season presents a new challenge and the team was focused on itself, Connaughton remembered the devastation of reaching the end of the road with a group of seniors who mentored her.

“I saw the heartbreak in those girls’ eyes, and I honestly never want to see that again,” Connaughton said. “[I’m] taking what I learned from that experience to now, just never getting too high on ourselves, but also keeping our confidence high. You never know what can happen, [we’re] not letting anything outside of the game affect our play.”

Last season, Connaughton went scoreless in the Atlantic 10 tournament final. This time, she posted three goals and three assists in a resounding 19-10 victory for UMass.

Winners of their first seven conference games, the Minutewomen have shifted their focus to a matchup with a flying Davidson squad. The Bobcats boast a seven-game winning streak and appear hungry to hand UMass its first regular season conference defeat since April 22, 2018.

“The biggest thing is adapting to the travel, where we can go in there and focus on how hard we’ve competed this week of practice,” Drummond said. “It’s really important for us to recognize that Davidson is super competitive. They’re competing just as hard and trying to get as many wins under their belt in the A10. For us, it’s just sticking to our game plan, keeping calm.”

As Connaughton looks to help the Minutewomen get one step closer to the conference tournament’s No. 1 seed, she said her primary motivation is steady improvement.

But Connaughton consistently carries an extra incentive in the back of her mind.

“[I] play for my sister, who’s my biggest motivator, my role model, my mentor,” Connaughton said. “Part of me just wants to be a little bit better than she was.”

DOUBTERS DIMINISHED

Charlotte heard all the national chatter ahead of its Friday night home tilt with South Florida.

The Bulls had flown through their first three AAC matchups, carrying a six-game winning streak into Jerry Richardson Stadium. A palpable buzz emerged around USF’s upstart program, including discussion as a conference championship dark horse in its inaugural season.

But the 49ers — first-year Division I competitors in their own right — didn’t mind their comparably dimmer spotlight as they tried for their first-ever AAC victory. In fact, Charlotte welcomed the doubters.

“We were so pumped because so many people doubted us,” attacker Kylie Gioia said. “We knew that from Monday to Friday in practice, and we just wanted to prove to ourselves — and honestly the world — that we could beat USF.”

Gioia, who embarked on a “once in a lifetime experience” when she departed Cincinnati after three seasons to join the 49ers for the 2025 campaign, helped Charlotte craft a new chapter in its program history book Friday night. The senior scored six goals and added an assist as Charlotte stunned the Bulls 17-16.

Amid the 49ers monumental win, Gioia buried a second-quarter twizzler that perhaps formed the Broomall, Pa., native’s signature primetime play. She had attempted a similar effort against American on March 11. Gioia said she knew, if given a similar opportunity, she wouldn’t make the same mistake twice.

“I knew if I actually put all of my might into the shot that it would’ve went in,” Gioia said. “Just having faith, and my teammate Brooke [Alessandrini], who fed me the ball, looked at me in a way that she knew I was going to score. I didn’t want to disappoint her or any of my teammates, so I took a smart opportunity and shot the ball the way I did. Thank God it went in.”

Last summer, Charlotte coach Clare Short sold Gioia and her fellow class of impact transfers on an ever-evolving vision for one of the nation’s newest programs.

The former Queens coach knew she’d encounter growing pains at the 49ers’ helm — but she relished the chance to work with a blank canvas.

“We barely had a locker room, [and] we had a 0-0 record,” Short said. “The girls that I recruited and ended up committing were all committed to the part of making history. They wanted to be part of that history, whether that be the first win, the first draw, the first conference win. Those types of history-making moments are something that only a few people get to be a part of.”

That first win came on Charlotte’s opening day, with the 49ers defeating Gardner-Webb 20-2 on Feb. 8. But Short’s squad encountered its fair share of hurdles. From March 11 to March 29, Charlotte dropped five consecutive defeats that included an 0-3 start to AAC play.

Short still saw glimpses of greatness at every turn. The 49ers closed their conference opener against Old Dominion on a 6-3 final-quarter run. They fought tooth and nail with Vanderbilt, falling 15-14 on March 22. A week later, Charlotte held a halftime lead over James Madison — though the Dukes weathered the upset alert in the game’s latter stages.

This past Friday, Short said her team finally put forth a collective effort for a full 60 minutes. With the 3-plus-hour game expanding beyond nightfall, the 49ers celebrated their statement win under the stadium lights.

“When we beat them, there were so many emotions, so many tears,” Gioia said. “So many people texted every single person on this team. They were so excited for us. Now that we feel the love, we’re excited to keep growing off that win.”

With its first-ever conference victory in hand, Charlotte will host Cal in its final non-conference test Friday before taking on East Carolina and Temple to close the regular season.

For Short, the team’s steady progression has fueled her fervor on the sidelines.

“They’ve been building and rising for the last couple weeks, so just to be able to see their hard work pay off and finally get that reward is the reason why I coach,” she said.

By the Numbers

2,542 • Days between regular season Big East losses for Denver, which fell to UConn 14-13 on Sunday. The result marked the Pioneers’ first regular season conference loss since April 21, 2018, against Florida.

72-31 • No. 3 Northwestern’s aggregate score against Big Ten opponents.

3 • Pivotal goals for North Carolina’s Caroline Godine, as the Tar Heels took down previously unbeaten Boston College on Saturday.

26 • Points for Hofstra’s Nikki Mennella in her past three games.

4 • Straight wins for a resurgent Penn State squad following Sunday’s 12-11 overtime victory over Ohio State.