President's Medal
David J. Urick
Hobart and William Smith Colleges President Mark D. Gearan presented the President's Medal to David J. Urick at the 2012 Hobart College Hall of Fame ceremony. As the head lacrosse coach at Hobart, Urick enjoyed unprecedented success, guiding the team to 10 straight NCAA Division III Championships. He went on to become head coach of Georgetown University's lacrosse team.
A 1970 graduate of Cortland State, where he starred in football and lacrosse, Urick joined the Hobart staff as an assistant football and lacrosse coach in 1971. He became head football coach in 1976, earning ICAC Coach of the Year honors. Urick became head lacrosse coach in 1980, and that same year won the Francis "Babe" Kraus Award as Division III Coach of the Year, an honor he would receive again in 1981. In 1987, Urick won his eighth straight Division III title, surpassing UCLA's John Wooden for most consecutive championships in a team sport. In 1989, Urick left Geneva to coach at Georgetown University.
In July 2012, he stepped down from his 23-year tenure as head coach of the men's lacrosse team. Urick brought the Hoyas' program to national prominence and established GU as one of the elite lacrosse programs in the country. Under his direction, the Hoyas finished with winning records in 21 of 23 seasons—the only winning seasons in the program's 37-year history of Division I competition. After leading GU to its first NCAA Tournament appearance in 1997, Urick was the recipient of Georgetown's 1996-97 Outstanding Coaching Achievement Award. He was named the ECAC Lacrosse League Coach of the Year in 2000 and again in 2007.
A member of the Hobart College Athletic Hall of Fame Class of 1990, Urick has been inducted into four additional Halls of Fame for his contributions to lacrosse as a player and coach, including the Cortland C-Club Hall of Fame in 1986, the Hall of Fame of the Upstate New York Lacrosse Foundation Chapter in 1991, the National Lacrosse Hall of Fame in 1998, and the Potomac Chapter of the U.S. Lacrosse Hall of Fame in 2005.
One of Urick's many honors was being selected to serve as head coach of the 1986 Team USA, which won the gold medal at the World Games in Toronto. Additionally, he served as an assistant on the 1982 USA team that won the gold medal and is the current chair of the USA Team Coaches Selection Committee. Urick is a former chair and member of the NCAA Men's Lacrosse Committee and the USILA Rules Advisory Committee.
Urick, who lives with his wife, Linda, in Fairfax, Va., continues to work at Georgetown as special assistant to the athletic director.