Last week, USA Lacrosse announced its annual high school player awards, including the Jackie Pitts Award that recognizes senior players who go above and beyond in service to their team, school, and community. These athletes truly honor the game of lacrosse by investing in the development of the game, by serving as exemplary teammates, and by being role models within their school community.
The most frequently asked question associated with this prestigious USA Lacrosse girls’ award is, ‘Who was Jackie Pitts?’
To fully answer that question, it’s imperative to understand the fuller history of women’s lacrosse, because Pitts is a central figure in that tale and played a pivotal role in the development of the sport.
In 1982, the newly formed International Federation of Women's Lacrosse Associations (IFWLA) hosted the first official women’s world lacrosse championship tournament. Played in Nottingham, England, the United States defeated Australia in the final game to capture that first world title.
The genesis of that event, which is now held every four years and has been contested 11 times, dates back to a casual conversation between two friends while sitting on a hillside watching a lacrosse game. Pitts, who coached the U.S. team in 1982 and again in 1986, was one of those friends.
“Maggie Boyd (president of the English Women’s Lacrosse Association) and I were just sitting on a hill in England, kind of away from everyone, but we could still keep our eye on the game being played,” Pitts recounted years later in a USA Lacrosse Magazine interview. “Maggie had contacted all the countries that were then playing lacrosse and asked if a World Cup type of thing would work. We ended up deciding right there that we wanted to have a World Cup or at least have an international lacrosse association for the promotion of lacrosse. And the first project was to have a world championship.”
At the time of that conversation in the mid-1970s, Pitts served as president of the United States Women’s Lacrosse Association (USWLA), which sponsored U.S. touring teams that competed in international exhibition events. It was the success of those international excursions, including an undefeated tour of Great Britain by the 1975 U.S squad, that served in large part as the catalyst for the launch of the quadrennial world championships.
“Jackie was an enthusiastic and passionate advocate and promoter of not just women’s lacrosse, but lacrosse in general,” said Joe Finn, lacrosse historian and archivist for the National Lacrosse Hall of Fame and Museum. “She worked hard to help grow the game here in the United States as well as around the world.”
Pitts’ career spanned the entire spectrum of the sport: player, coach, educator, camp director, administrator, national leader and international pioneer. Her leadership included tenures as president of both the USWLA and eventually, the international federation. She also served as a mentor to many others within the women’s lacrosse community.
“So many of us benefitted from her coaching at summer camps and during the U.S. squad weekends,” said Hall of Fame coach Feffie Barnhill. “Jackie was a mentor, a friend, and the first world ambassador for women’s lacrosse. She should be recognized as the most influential developer of women’s lacrosse.”
In no small part due to her years of leadership and service, today the international governing body for lacrosse, World Lacrosse, has a worldwide membership of 94 countries.
Pitts was inducted to the Delaware Sports Hall of Fame in 1983, the St. Lawrence University Hall of Fame in 1986, and became one of the first women inducted to the National Lacrosse Hall of Fame in 1993. She was also the inaugural recipient of USA Lacrosse’s Lifetime Achievement Award in 2015.
Pitts passed away last year at the age of 87, but her legacy will forever remain as part of the fabric of women’s lacrosse.
“Jackie did so much for and was involved with so much in women’s lacrosse that it is hard to imagine what women’s lacrosse would be without Jackie Pitts,” Finn said. “She truly was a tireless ambassador for the game, and it’s certainly appropriate that USA Lacrosse gives the Jackie Pitts Award every year to high school seniors throughout the nation who go over and above to serve their team, school and community. That was Jackie Pitts.”
Fittingly for a pioneer who contributed so much to the development of the game, Pitts’ impact now continues well beyond her lifetime. Pitts bequeathed a generous portion from her estate to USA Lacrosse for the purpose of preserving the game’s history in the National Hall of Fame & Museum.
“We’re extremely grateful that Jackie’s legacy will continue and be further magnified through this generous estate gift,” said Chris Dax, Vice President of Philanthropy at USA Lacrosse. “Jackie was a transformative figure in the history of lacrosse and was always a strong partner to USA Lacrosse. She was always supportive of our mission, and her gift will continue to support that mission.”
Making a Gift to Support USA Lacrosse
Through the benefits of planned giving, donors can leave a lasting legacy to USA Lacrosse and the USA Lacrosse Foundation. The A. Norman Webb Jr. Legacy Society recognizes those who follow in Jackie Pitts’ example of leadership by making a planned gift to the USA Lacrosse Foundation. Learn More Here
