Powerhouse Women: How Lacrosse Built a Generation of Leaders

They learned to lead with a stick in their hands.

Today, these women carry that same competitive fire into boardrooms, pro leagues, major corporations, government, the military and even outer space.

From CEOs to astronauts, commissioners to political leaders, their journeys trace back to lacrosse: a sport that taught decisiveness, teamwork, resilience and joy.

This collection celebrates the athletes turned executives redefining what power looks like in traditionally male dominated arenas — and widening the path for everyone who follows.

Baker is the athletic director at Johns Hopkins and a former Navy officer whose path to leadership began with a late start in lacrosse. A United States Naval Academy graduate, she flew F/A-18s and credits the sport for sharpening the decision-making and resilience she relied on in the cockpit. After military service, she built a career in athletics administration at Cornell and beyond before returning to Hopkins in 2019 as AD. Baker champions access, mentorship, and innovation, guiding the department through rapid change while supporting the growth of student-athletes and women in leadership.

A politician and combat veteran, Beaty was elected mayor of Beaverton, Oregon and took office in 2021 as the first female and youngest mayor in the city’s history. A rising star politically, Beaty coached women’s lacrosse at the high school and collegiate level and previously served as president of the Oregon Girls Lacrosse Association.

A world champion jet skier and state champion high school girls’ lacrosse coach in Indianapolis, Boles is the president of Blackburn Sports Marketing and the wife of Indianapolis Motor Speedway president Doug Boles. The Indianapolis Star dubbed Boles the First Lady of the Indy 500. She grew up around racing. Her son, Conor Daly, is an Indy car driver.

DeCecco is a trailblazing leader and one of lacrosse’s most decorated defenders, the only player at her position to win the Tewaaraton Award (2003) after leading Princeton to consecutive national titles. A U.S. national team veteran and Hall of Famer, she now serves as vice president of lacrosse for the Premier Lacrosse League. DeCecco helped guide the PLL’s successful 2020 bubble season and is the driving force behind the Women’s Lacrosse League. A former healthcare executive, she continues to champion opportunity, visibility, and growth for women’s lacrosse at every level.

WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert was the New Jersey Player of the Year in lacrosse and played at Lehigh, where she also walked onto the basketball team. “Lacrosse was my sport,” she said in 2020. “My athletics experiences molded me.” After graduating in 1986, Engelbert built a career at Deloitte, ultimately becoming CEO — making her the first woman to lead a Big Four accounting firm. In 2019, she brought that executive experience to professional sports, assuming the role of WNBA commissioner and guiding the league through a new era of growth and visibility. 

After a successful 10-year stint as the director of media sales for the PGA Tour, Howard co-founded the Sturges Sports Group, which builds brands through alignment with women’s sports. She’s also on the board of directors for Major League Table Tennis. Howard was a two-sport Division I athlete at Virginia and captain of the Cavaliers’ 1991 NCAA champion lacrosse team.

Everyone watches women’s sports. Jamieson is banking on it. A former Yale lacrosse captain, Jamieson is the managing partner of Tipt Ventures, a venture capital fund she co-founded on the premise that women will be a driving force in the transformation of sports. Jamieson was previously strategy director for the Global Sports Venture Studio at R/GA Ventures and director of business partnerships for LIFT Labs at Comcast NBCUniversal. She joined the USA Lacrosse Board of Directors in 2024. 

A three-sport athlete at Yale who competed for USA in field hockey and lacrosse, Keating specialized in commercial banking for Fortune-ranked corporations before becoming an executive recruiter in 1986. She was managing director and senior client partner at Korn/Ferry for 17 years before starting her own agency. She previously served on the USA Lacrosse Foundation Board.

An attorney, author and the 11th inspector general of New York, Lang played four seasons of women’s lacrosse at Swarthmore. After graduating from Columbia Law School, she began her legal career in New York. She worked as an assistant district attorney, a special counsel for policy and projects and executive director of the Manhattan DA Academy. She has been the executive director of the Institute for Innovation in Prosecution at John Jay College, a lecturer in law at Columbia Law School and a founder and teacher of Columbia’s innovative Inside Criminal Justice seminar. 

Lavallee is the CEO of Voya Financial, a Fortune 500 company that provides health, wealth and investment solutions. She was recognized on Forbes’ “50 Over 50” list in 2023 and the Hartford Business Journal’s “Top 25 Women in Business” in 2022. Before embarking on a decorated career in financial services, she was a three-sport athlete at Colby. She played soccer, ice hockey and lacrosse at the school, graduating in 1992. 

Leahy is the CEO of CDW, a leading provider of information technology solutions. The Fortune 500 company’s revenue exceeds $20 billion annually. Leahy was a two-time state champion for the Stuart Country Day (N.J.) lacrosse team and played briefly at Brown. She was chief revenue officer at CDW before being named chair and CEO in 2019. Leahy also serves on the board of directors for Target Corporation, Northwestern Memorial Hospital, Junior Achievement of Chicago and Brightpoint.

Known in NorCal lacrosse circles as Coach Dre, Lin was the vice president of corporate strategy at tech leader Salesforce and is the co-founder of Stealth Startup. She’s a published author and expert in artificial intelligence and data best practices. Lin has been on the board of directors at USA Lacrosse since 2023. 

McDaniel is the youngest chair in USA Lacrosse history, taking the role in 2024 at age 36. A four-time world champion, she captained U.S. teams to gold and starred at Duke, where she was a two-time captain. Her journey began in Massachusetts youth lacrosse and the USA Lacrosse National Tournament. Off the field, McDaniel built a successful tech career, earning an MBA from Harvard and rising to executive leadership roles. Since joining the board in 2020, she has championed growth, inclusion, and investment in women’s sports while helping shape the game’s future.

The senior vice president of impact at Athletes Unlimited — a network of professional women’s sports leagues that previously included lacrosse — Meyer has dedicated her life to advocacy and social justice. She was a two-time Patriot League Defensive Player of the Year in two sports at Colgate, playing goalie for the Raiders’ lacrosse and field hockey teams. Meyer graduated from Colgate in 1999, studied law at Rutgers and dedicated her career to defending LGBTQIA+ rights before joining AU in 2022.

A NASA astronaut and former U.S. Marine Corps pilot who completed 150 combat missions, Moghbeli studied aerospace engineering at MIT— where she was also a three-sport athlete in volleyball, basketball and lacrosse. She was the mission commander of NASA’s SpaceX Crew-7 and a flight engineer aboard the International Space Station. In 2020, Moghbeli was chosen for the team of 18 astronauts who would be eligible to fly on the earliest missions of the Artemis program, which would return American astronauts to the moon for the first time since 1972.

Rodriguez is a sports business executive and USA Lacrosse board member known for building teams and shaping leagues. A former standout under Princeton coach Chris Sailer, she went on to help launch MLS clubs like Atlanta United and the San Jose Earthquakes, as well as the Washington Freedom. She later served as chief operating officer of the WNBA and was named to Sports Business Journal’s “40 Under 40.” Since joining USA Lacrosse in 2021, Rodriguez has focused on long-term growth, investment, and expanding opportunities across the sport.

A financial regulator best known for serving as chair of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission from 2009-2012, Schapiro led post-financial crisis reforms and strengthened investor protections during the Obama administration. In 2009, Forbes ranked her the 56th most powerful woman in the world. Schapiro previously chaired FINRA and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and is currently the vice chair of Global Public Policy at Bloomberg. She played lacrosse and field hockey at Franklin & Marshall when both teams went from club to varsity status in the 1970s. 

Once listed by Forbes as one of the 10 most powerful women in the world, Whitman held executive roles at Walt Disney Company, DreamWorks, Procter & Gamble and Hasbro before a 10-year run as CEO at eBay. She was also the CEO at Hewlett-Packard from 2011-2015 and served during the Biden administration as ambassador to Kenya. Whitman grew up on Long Island and played lacrosse at Princeton, graduating in 1977.