Bryant Assistant Jason Rife Tabbed Head Coach at Wagner

July 17, 2007

Jason Rife was an assistant on last year's NE-10 Regular seaon champions

SMITHFIELD, RI- Coming off an 11-4 season and regular season NE-10 championship, Bryant men's lacrosse assistant Jason Rife has been named the new head coach at Wagner College in New York. Over Rife's four years Bryant appeared in the Northeast 10 championship game twice and went a combined 45-20, including 34-5 in conference play. He has also overseen the development of five Division II All-Americans along the way.

"I am extremely excited and grateful about the opportunity to become the head coach at Wagner College," said Rife. "I look forward to the opportunity to develop the program and am extremely excited about the future of Wagner Lacrosse. I would like to take this opportunity to thank all of the former coaches and colleagues that I have worked for to be able to gain the knowledge that enabled me to take advantage of this fantastic situation."

Prior to Bryant, Rife was an assistant coach at his alma mater, the University of Massachusetts in Amherst for two seasons helping them to the NCAA Division I quarterfinals during the 2003 campaign. In 2002, he helped pilot Washington & Lee to the Division III semi-finals and the Old Dominion Athletic Conference championship. Before that he began his collegiate coaching career in California, helping Whittier from 1998-2000.

He broke into coaching at the high school level upon graduation.

Rife graduated from UMASS in 1995 and participated in the NCAA Tournament.

In between his stint at Whittier and Washington & Lee he spent three years as a special education teacher at Hawthorne Academy in Hawthorne, California.

Jason joins his wife Karen, now the head women's lacrosse coach at Wagner.