By Tim Glon

Former Wittenberg head coach Beth Hemminger has been named the first-ever head coach of the Ohio Northern women's lacrosse program.

Hemminger will take over the reigns of Ohio Northern's new program, which will begin varsity play in the spring of 2016.

"Coming to Ohio Northern is certainly something to be excited about," Hemminger said. "It is about new beginnings. For the school, for student-athletes and for me as a coach. ONU is a wonderful school with strong academics, a beautiful campus and an outstanding athletics tradition. I expect it to be an easy sell to top-level student-athletes. I am excited about the challenge of building a new program."

"We are very excited to have such a quality person and coach in Beth Hemminger to start up our women's lacrosse program," ONU director of athletics Tom Simmons said. "She has a great  amount of success as both a player and coach. We wanted to get our program off on the right track and Beth is the perfect fit for Ohio Northern."

Hemminger was the head coach at Wittenberg for the past three seasons and guided her teams to a 38-12 record and a perfect 22-0 league record during that time.

She also served as head coach at St. Anne's Catholic High School in Hamilton, Ohio, in 2010.

Hemminger has assistant coaching experience at New Haven (Conn.) from 2005-09 and again in 2011, and at her alma mater Wooster in 2004.

She was a 2004 graduate of Wooster, earning four varsity letters in soccer and lacrosse.

In lacrosse, she was a three-time All-American and was named the 2003 North Coach Athletic Conference Player of the Year in 2003.

She re-wrote the record books at Wooster, scoring 300 points career points and a school record 85 in her senior year.

In soccer, she earned All-NCAC honors four straight years and third-team All-Great Lakes Region honors in 2000 as a starting forward.