Roland Park lacrosse coaches Kristin Nicolini and Reagan Koffel, sisters who played for the Reds, have retired after seven seasons, including three in which they reached the Interscholastic Athletic Association of Maryland A Conference final.
Both have small children and said family was foremost in their decision to step away from coaching. Nicolini has three children under the age of 5, including a 6-month old son, and Koffel has a 9-month old son.
"It's just something we had been talking about for about two years," Nicolini, 35, said. "As that goes, we just kept putting it off. With me, this is planning to be my last baby and I just realized that there's a lot of time that's taken away from my life at home and it's needed there.
"We'll still be the biggest Roland Park fans there are. It was funny, my 5-year old, when I told her, she was sad and she said, 'Can we still go to the games, Mommy?' I said, 'Yeah, we will, just in a different way.' It's getting to be a 12-month job almost and it definitely does take a toll."
The No. 3 Reds reached the A Conference title game earlier this month for the third time in five seasons, but they could never get past No. 1 McDonogh, falling by a total of five goals in those three games. The Raneri sisters posted an 81-53 record with the Reds.
"It's totally bittersweet," Koffel, 36, said. "We love it so much but it's so hard when your'e pulled in two different directions. She has three kids and I just had my first and hopefully, a second one at some point, so we just saw it as the right opportunity or the right time to make that decision to put your family first. We thought it was fair to the girls to make that decision when we did, because we didn't want to be too torn and not give them or the family the time that both of them needed."
Nicolini will continue to work in the Roland Park communications office. Koffel is a sixth-grade teacher at Loyola Blakefield.
While coaching the Reds, 72 of their players have gone on to play in college with eight named All-Americans and 16, Academic All-Americans.
As players, the sisters each played on an Association of Independent Schools championship lacrosse team at Roland Park, Koffel in 1994 and Nicolini in 1998, the last time the Reds won a lacrosse title. They went on to play together at Georgetown, where both played in NCAA championships.
They began coaching together at Garrison Forest in 2006 and went 45-11 over three seasons with one B Conference championship.