VMI women’s soccer announces staff promotion, addition

VMI women’s soccer has promoted long-time volunteer assistant coach LT Kristen Laraway to assistant coach and has also added Kelly Bergmann as the program’s new volunteer assistant.

Laraway has spent the past two seasons as the program’s volunteer assistant, and with her new title, will continue to aid with team conditioning and general program administration. She was a four-year letterwinner at Navy who also, during her time at sea, played at the Conseil International du Sport Militaire (CISM) 8th World Military Women’s Football Championship in Warendorf, Germany.

VMI head coach Chris BergmannBergmann, meanwhile, will work with husband Chris once again after doing so for several seasons at Lake Forest College. Kelly Bergmann spent six seasons on the Lake Forest staff, working with the men’s soccer program in 2009 and from 2011-2014.

Lake Forest posted a combined 55-35-5 record in Bergmann’s time on staff. The 2013 team finished with a 14-7-0 overall record and claimed its second straight Midwest Conference championship with a mark of 9-1-0 in league play. The Foresters also won the MWC Tournament and earned the program’s first berth in the NCAA Division III Tournament since 1981.

Bergmann was the head women’s soccer coach at Hope International University in Fullerton, California, where she was named NCCAA West Region Coach of the Year in 2005. She was also an assistant women’s soccer coach and head softball coach at Trinity International University in Deerfield, Illinois, for two years and led the softball team to the 2007 NCCAA National Tournament.

The Chesterfield, Missouri, native was a dual-sport collegiate student-athlete playing soccer and softball at Wheaton College (Ill.) and graduating with bachelors degrees in communications and educational formation. She was a part of the 2001 NCAA DIII National Championship Final Four soccer team and co-captained the 2001 Wheaton softball team. She stayed on while a graduate student at Wheaton as an assistant softball coach and earned a masters degree in educational formation in 2003.

Bergmann has played and coached internationally with the Chicago Eagles Soccer Club and Southern California Seahorses in Brazil, Holland, Sweden, and Mexico.

The Keydet women’s soccer program opens its 2015 season August 14, with an exhibition in Lynchburg against Liberty.