(INTRODUCTION: In 1986,  Rochester accepted a bid to the first women's NCAA Women's  Division III Championship. The Yellowjacket program was nine years old. The 1982 NCAA tournament was not broken down by divisions. UR played in the first round. The Yellowjackets won back-to-back NY State AIAW Championships in 1984 and 1985. In the quarterfinals of the 1986 NCAAs, Rochester won, 3-1, at Smith College in Massachusetts. UR knew the field at Cortland. The Yellowjackets won the Dragon Cup at Cortland in mid-September. The November trip to Central New York was much more important. Mary Martha Winter McKenna '90, '95M has the details.)

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It was my freshman year at the U of R, fall of 1986. Our team had outplayed most on our schedule, including a tie against D1 Cornell, entering the NCAA semifinals 12-2-2. The team anxiously awaited  where the Final Four would be played. We hoped that UC San Diego would be chosen as the site. No such luck. We packed our bags for Cortland, NY.
 
We arrived the day before to get acclimated and have an opportunity to practice on their sod. At the time, we were one of few teams who played on turf as a home field. Not quite like the turf that we'd grown accustomed to back in Rochester. This turf, that was rock hard and state of the art at the same time, giving our opponents trouble as they sent long balls out of bounds, and had difficulty managing clean traps. We held the 'secret of the turf' as we called it, as did the Yellowjacket visitors.
 
Our team waited on the bus, as the California players finished up their practice. They, of course, wore coats, and hats, the works on this cold November day. Coach (Terry Gurnett) was always up for a good old-fashioned joke. Our squad decided to leave our layers on the bus, and took the field dressed in shorts and t-shirts, as though it were balmy out. This, for the benefit of UCSD, producing the gawking expressions we hoped for. This would be the first of several victories on the weekend.
 
Despite a lousy night's sleep at the local motel, we came as ready as we'd ever be. We'd trained hard, had taken our share of LSD runs (long slow distance), we cringed as TG called out, "meet me on the end line (for suicides)!". Our shadow play was strong; we were prepared to attack from all sides.  We had paid our dues with drills requiring us to take plenty of punted balls out of the air with our heads. "Be first!" Coach called. We had endured (and enjoyed) plenty of center circle fat jokes about TG's (slim) sister Mo while stretching. We survived bus trips where the driver would 'fake right, and go left'. We were ready.
 
On this cold, icy day our hair was French-braided and (Jill) McCabe had handed out the bazooka gum.  We'd stowed the comic and fortune in our socks for good luck. We played 5 v 2 along with the rest of the prescribed warm ups.  Terry pulled us from warm up drills at the last second, and produced a high speed, energized pre-game talk. 'Terry time' as we fondly call it, was part of the routine that we had grown familiar with. Our adrenalin matched his, and we played with the p--- -and-vinegar that we were coached to play with. The result was a 2-0 win over UCSD, followed by a shutout the next day as well (1-0 vs. Plymouth State). The first-ever, team national championship produced at UR.
 
When asked about my best memory as a player, it was as much about what surrounded the games. Winning two national championships was incredible in its own right, but the fondest memories are of the superstitions, the jokes, the trips, and the relationships built that endure today.
 
(ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Mary Martha Winter McKenna played in four consecutive NCAA tournaments for Rochester (1986-1989). The Yellowjackets won the 1987 national title as well, this time at Edwin Fauver Stadium. Winter McKenna earned All-America honors in 1986. She was inducted into the Yellowjacket Athletic Hall of Fame in 2003.)