Carol LaMarche is entering her 11th year with the Golden Knights' Volleyball program. LaMarche, who has been on the sideline the last nine years in addition to coaching Clarkson back in 2005, led the Knights to another Liberty League title in 2021, the fourth conference banner since taking the reins back in 2016. When the Knights went 20-10 in 2021, it marked the fifth time that LaMarche has won 20 matches in a season. This past campaign, the Golden Knights reached the postseason for a 13th consecutive season.
LaMarche, who has guided the Knights to league titles in 2016, 2017, 2019, and 2021, has earned numerous coaching honors, including AVCA New York Region Coach of the Year (2017 and 2019), ECAC Coach of the Year (2019), and Liberty League Coach of the Year (2019), winning 172 matches overall (including the 2005 season) for a .628 winning percentage. With a first-round victory in the NCAA Tournament in 2021, Clarkson extended its streak of winning at least one match in the tournament to 10. The team reached its fifth NCAA Quarterfinals in 2019, where the squad had its best showing ever in the NCAA Tournament, winning the regional and then taking defending national champion and top-seeded Emory to five sets.
In 2005, LaMarche produced of 20-14 and now has a lifetime mark of 159-87 in eight campaigns with the Knights. Prior to Clarkson, LaMarche served as an assistant coach at her alma mater Syracuse University from 2006-2010. She then spent five years as the head coach at SUNY Canton, producing a 130-47 (.734 winning percentage) record in that time frame, including four straight seasons with at least 27 victories and NCAA Regional rankings in several of those campaigns.
A 2002 graduate of Syracuse University, LaMarche spent four seasons with the Orange, totaling 741 kills and 95 blocks while averaging 3.49 kills per set in a career that spanned from 1998-2001, with the team winning 80 of its 130 matches over those four seasons.
Following her successful career as a student-athlete at Syracuse, where she was named a Big East Academic All-Star on two occasions, LaMarche served as a Graduate Assistant Coach while completing her master's degree in Accounting. Once she earned her master's degree, she spent one year playing in the National French League for the Chatelaillon-Plage N1 Volleyball team. She returned to the United States and assumed coaching duties at Clarkson University in 2005, guiding the Knights to a record of 20-14, including a 2-2 record in the round-robin Liberty League Tournament that November. She coached four Liberty League All-Stars in her first season with the Knights.
In her five seasons as assistant coach at Syracuse University, the team won 20 or more matches on three occasions, including a record of 23-9 in 2010. When SUNY Canton restarted its volleyball program in 2010-11, LaMarche was tapped to guide the Kangaroos and she guided the team to a 19-14 record after the program had taken a two-year hiatus. From there, the Roos averaged 27.5 wins per season from 2012-2015 and were an aggregate 78 games over .500 in that four-year stretch.
LaMarche and her husband Phil are the parents of two children, Wyatt and Colette.
