Amherst College is expected to name Rashad Devoe to replace Jon Thompson as the men’s lacrosse coach, according to Terry Foy of Inside Lacrosse.
Devoe was hired away after one season as the head coach at Division I Hampton University in Virginia, where he was the second head coach in the program’s history after it was elevated from a club squad in 2016. During the program’s brief five-year history, the Pirates went from playing Division III teams to taking on Division I foes. This year Hampton were swashbuckled by Mercer, 28-6, and Furman, 19-4, en route to an 0-6 record before the season was canceled by the coronavirus pandemic.
This will be the seventh coaching stop in 10 years for the well-traveled Devoe. He began with assistant coaching stints at Southwestern University in Texas and fellow NESCAC school Colby College in Maine, spent a year in Texas at a developmental academy called Iron Horse Lacrosse, and in 2016 was named head coach at Beloit College in Wisconsin. His teams were 23-24 overall, including 10-6 in 2017 when he was named Midwest Lacrosse Conference Coach of the Year.
In 2018 Devoe coached the U.S. Naval Academy Prep School lacrosse team in Newport, R.I., and last August he was named head coach at Hampton.
According to sources, Devoe was one of four finalists to interview for the job. He’ll replace Jon Thompson, who was 125-47 in nine-plus seasons at the small liberal arts college. Thompson was dismissed after a controversial article in the school’s student newspaper reported that several lacrosse players were involved in an alleged racial incident in an Amherst dormitory on March 8.