The two assistant coaches on the UMass Field Hockey team, Holly Turbill and Simon van de Loo, may be new to UMass and even the United States, but they are certainly not new to field hockey. 

Turbill, from Staffordshire, England and van de Loo, from Eindhoven, Netherlands, both experienced entirely different coaching paths in their journey to UMass. However, both coaches have a common goal in mind and that goal is winning.

Turbill started her head coaching career in 2014 at the Milton Abbey School right after she graduated from college. After three years coaching and teaching at the school, Turbill spent the next six years building her coaching resume, going from Brighton College to the Shrewsbury School and then spent four years at the Culford School.

The experienced English coach spoke about the final job she held before coming to the United States. “In my last year [coaching in England], I was at Surbiton High School as the head of performance and joined the hockey club there which is probably one of the best hockey clubs in the world,” said Turbill. “I was lucky enough to coach loads of really high performance kids.”

As for van de Loo, he began his coaching career at a young age coaching youth field hockey. During this time he was a player and captain for the Hockey Club Asten-Someren (HCAS) in the Netherlands. After a career ending injury, van de Loo became the head coach of HCAS.

During his two and a half seasons coaching HCAS, the team was promoted to a division higher under van de Loo’s watch. Van de Loo then took an assistant coaching job with Den Bosch, a team that competes at the highest level of field hockey in the Netherlands.

There, for two seasons, van de Loo coached numerous olympians from plenty of different countries while learning from some of the best in the business according to van de Loo. 

“[My first season at Den Bosch] was with the head coach Eric Verboom,” said van de Loo. “He’s currently the assistant coach of the Dutch National Men’s Team. I learned a lot from him. He’s fantastic in my opinion, one of the best trainers in the world.”

“I did one more year as an assistant at Den Bosch under the supervision of Marc Lammers,” said van de Loo. “Lammers, he won the olympic gold with the Dutch national team he’s a phenomenal coach in the field hockey world. [I] learned a lot from him as well.”

Turbill and van de Loo, after leaving their respective coaching jobs at Surbiton and Den Bosch, both came to the United States to be assistant coaches for the UMass Field Hockey team, head coached by Barb Weinberg. Both assistant coaches started before the 2023 season.

The two coaches spoke about the differences between the game in their countries compared to the college game in the United States. “The seasons are totally different,” said Turbill. “In England we start in September and we would finish in April, maybe May. … The club season goes the whole way through and you just break in the summer. Whereas here it is an intense two, two and a half months.”

“If you’re in Holland and you say ‘I’m a field hockey coach,’ the first question they will ask is ‘Okay but what do you do for a living then?’,” said van de Loo. “[Here in the United States] as a coach you can really focus on your main job and back home in Holland, I was an assistant at a side job just to make ends meet. Here it’s a full profession. It’s just completely different.”

Between a different schedule and the job of assistant field hockey coach being regarded in a different light, both coaches have fit in well.

“Barb, the head coach, made sure that we felt right away at home,” said van de Loo. “[Holly and I] established quite well here in the United States. The team and all the supporting staff feels like a family away from home.”

“[The players] are really great and we have such a good time,” said Turbill. “When you’ve got a good relationship with them it makes the tougher conversations a little bit easier. When they know that you’ve got their best interest at heart, you’re going to tell them the truth, it makes it easier when you have to have the tougher conversations.”

Recruiting is a major part of both Turbill and van de Loo’s jobs. According to van de Loo, both coaches almost immediately went on a recruiting trip to Argentina just days after they came to the United States for the first time. Both coaches expect to recruit players for the coming years from their respective home countries. Van de Loo said he was in the Netherlands doing some recruiting during this winter.

“With the help of the fact that me and Simon are now international, I feel like we have a little bit of a different view and a different take on things,” said Turbill. “We have different relationships in the countries that we’re from so it sort of gives us an added benefit of coaching and who we know abroad.”

While the coaches were quick to recruit, they were also quick to change the structure of how UMass plays the game of field hockey. “[When Holly and I started coaching at UMass] we changed the way how the team plays,” said van de Loo. “Before, the team played a more zonal structure. Now, we’re playing a more man-to-man structure. That’s something completely different so that’s quite a big change we made with the team and I think we made a huge progression as a team.”

The “progression” as van de Loo calls it is apparent as in both 2022 and 2023 UMass made it to the A10 championship game both seasons against Saint Joseph’s but in 2022, the Minutewomen were shut out and could not record a single shot on goal. Whereas in 2023, it was a one goal game that Massachusetts was in the game until the very end.

“From a collective point of view we were happy with how the season went,” said Turbill. “If anything, it is just the start of what’s to come.”

Both coaches are set on the goal for next season. “Next year we are going to win the A10. I’m determined that’s going to happen. That needs to be the way we see it. There is no point in going into a season thinking ‘oh we’re gonna come second again.’ I think our mentality has shifted and I think the girls know that they can win the A10 as well now so that is going to be our biggest target.”

“This year we need to put a ring on the finger,” said van de Loo. “That’s of course our main goal. With the progression we have made, it is realistic to aim for that A10 Championship.”

“I can’t wait to get on the field with [the team] for next season because I know we are closing the gap,” said van de Loo. “We already made a huge step nationally, we gained five spots [in the national ranking when comparing this past season’s finish to the season before]. We are ready for the other five spots to jump on the list to get in the top 10 for next season.”