SUNY - Cortland Women's Softball

Molly O’Donnell enters her seventh season as Cortland's softball head coach in 2026. During the 2025 season, O'Donnell led the Red Dragons to both the State University of New York Athletic Conference (SUNYAC) regular-season and tournament titles. Cortland finished the season 25-16 and tied for 17th place nationally after posting a 2-2 record in NCAA Division III regional play. O'Donnell and her assistants were selected as the SUNYAC Coaching Staff of the Year. O'Donnell has a combined record of 126-65 (.660) in six seasons (including a shortened 2020 campaign). In 2024, she led the Red Dragons to a 29-9 mark and a second-place finish in the SUNYAC tournament. Her 2023 squad finished 24-13 and tied for fourth in the SUNYAC tournament after finishing second during the regular season. In 2022, Cortland posted a 26-15 record and advanced to the finals of the SUNYAC tournament, and in 2021 the Red Dragons went 20-10, won the SUNYAC Eastern Division title, and advanced to the finals of the SUNYAC postseason tournament. The league used a divisional format that season due to a COVID-19 related schedule reduction. O'Donnell's inaugural season as head coach in 2020 was cut short after a 2-2 mark when the remainder of the season was canceled. O'Donnell's teams have featured two All-Americans and 15 all-region selections along with nine Academic All-District and one Academic All-America honorees. O'Donnell previously served as the Red Dragons' associate head coach during the 2018-19 school year and was an assistant coach in the program during the 2015 and 2016 seasons. She helped Cortland finished 31-16, win both the SUNYAC regular-season and postseason titles, and finish second in an NCAA regional to tie for 17th place nationally in 2019. In her previous two years as an assistant, Cortland had a combined 74-24 record, won two SUNYAC crowns and earned four NCAA tournament wins.   The Niskayuna, N.Y., native served as an assistant coach at Division I Columbia University in 2017 and 2018. Working with the Lions’ hitters, she helped the team set school single-season records for runs scored, home runs, RBI and total bases in 2017 and establish new school records in batting average, slugging percentage, runs, homers, triples, RBI, walks and total bases in 2018.   Prior to her first stint at Cortland, O’Donnell spent the 2014 season at Skidmore College, where she helped guide the Thoroughbreds to their first postseason appearance in four years. O’Donnell and the rest of the Skidmore staff were named 2014 Liberty League Coaching Staff of the Year.   A two-year captain and four-year letterwinner at Ithaca College, O’Donnell was named a First Team Empire 8 All-Star as a freshman in 2010 and earned second-team accolades after hitting .348 with 29 RBI her junior season. O’Donnell’s performance in the 2010 postseason landed her on the NCAA Regional All-Tournament Team. O’Donnell graduated magna cum laude from Ithaca in 2013 with a bachelor’s degree in sport management. She went on to complete her master’s in sport management at Cortland in 2015. Additionally, O’Donnell has completed National Fastpitch Coaches Convention (NFCC) courses in World Series Observation, Offensive Strategy and Dynamic Practice Planning.   O’Donnell graduated from Niskayuna High School in 2009. She played five seasons of softball for the Silver Warriors, earning All-Suburban Council honors as a junior and senior, and also lettered in basketball and field hockey. O'Donnell currently resides in Cortland with her wife, Chelsea, and their daughters, Riley and Nora.  

Megan LaMont joined the Cortland softball coaching staff in the 2023-24 season after a four-year playing career with the Red Dragons from 2020-23. A team captain in her junior and senior years, LaMont appeared in 59 games during her Cortland career. The Amsterdam, N.Y., native is a 2019 graduate of Amsterdam High School, where she was a four-year starter and four-time all-conference player. She also earned the team's Defensive MVP award twice and was a team captain as a senior.

Veronica Ribot-Canales enters her fifth year as diving coach at SUNY Cortland in 2025-26.   Ribot-Canales was named the State University of New York Athletic Conference (SUNYAC) Women's Diving Coach of the Year in each of her first two seasons at Cortland (2021-22 and 2022-23). She also was part of Cortland's SUNYAC Men's Co-Swimming and Diving Coaching Staff of the Year in 2021-22, the SUNYAC Men's Swimming and Diving Staff of the Year in 2024-25, and the 2024-25 SUNYAC-AMCC championship Women's Diving Coach of the Meet along with being part of the Men's Staff of the Meet and Women's Staff of the Meet.   In 2021-22, Ribot-Canales' divers included Taylor Williams, who earned All-America honors with a sixth-place finish on the 3-meter springboard and honorable mention All-America honors with a 16th-place showing on the 1-meter springboard at the NCAA Division III Championships in Indianapolis. Her performances earned the Red Dragons a 29th-place national finish, the team's best national finish in more than 30 years. Williams also earned SUNYAC Women's Diver of the Year and Women's Diver of the Championship Meet awards.   Four of Ribot-Canales' divers qualified for the 2021-22 NCAA Region 4 (Northeast and South) Championships. At the SUNYAC Championships, her female divers placed first, second and fourth on the 3-meter board and first, second and fifth on the 1-meter board, while her top male diver placed sixth on both boards.   In 2022-23, Ribot-Canales' diving contingent included Ashley Zachgo, who qualified for the NCAA Division III Championships in Greensboro, N.C., and was named both the SUNYAC Women's Diver of the Year and Women's Diver of the Championship Meet. Two Cortland women and two men qualified for the NCAA regional meet, and at the SUNYAC Championships the women featured a first and sixth-place finish on both boards while the men placed fourth and fifth in the 1-meter competition and fifth and seventh in the 3-meter event.   In 2023-24, her men's divers included Lance Meeson, who qualified for regionals and missed qualifying for nationals by one point, and Kazuki Kadota-Browner, who set a school record for the 1-meter board (11 dives). On the women's side, Madison Heffern advanced to the finals at the SUNYAC Championships on both the 1-meter and 3-meter boards and Alyssa Haberlack advanced to the finals on the 3-meter board and won the 1-meter consolation final. During the 2024-25 season, three of her divers qualified for NCAA regionals - Kadota-Browner and Kohlhoff on the men's side and Alyssa Haberlack on the women's side. Kohlhoff was named the SUNYAC Men's Diver of the Year and Haberlack earned SUNYAC Women's Diver of the Year. Haberlack won the SUNYAC-AMCC 1-meter title and Megan McLaughlin was the 3-meter champion at the combined conference meet to earn SUNYAC-AMCC Co-Women's Diver of the Meet honors. A highly accomplished diver, Ribot-Canales was the Masters National Champion in the 1-meter and 3-meter springboard events as well as the Grand Masters event (open only to past national champions, NCAA champions and Olympians) at the 2023 Masters Summer Nationals in Iowa City. She also competed at the Masters World Championships in Fukuoka, Japan, in August 2023, where she became Masters World Champion in both individual events in the 60-64 age group. In 2024, she won another three individual events at the 50th Anniversary Masters Nationals at Ohio State and five titles at the Summer Masters Nationals in Novato, Calif. In 2025, she competed at the World Aquatics Masters Diving World Championships in Singapore and competed in three individual events and two synchronized diving events over a span of six days. She won four gold medals and world titles (1-meter and 3-meter springboard and platform as well as synchronized 3-meter springboard), and she and her partner captured a silver medal in the synchronized platform event. These results made her an overall 9-time World Masters Champion.   Prior to the start of Ribot-Canales's coaching career, she was a four-time Olympian representing her native Argentina. She was a 12-time South American Champion, a Pan American Silver & Bronze medalist on the 10-meter platform, a U.S. Olympic Festival Gold & Bronze medalist on springboard, and a two-time U.S. National Champion on 3-meter springboard.     As an all-around diver, Veronica was the only woman at the 1992 Barcelona Olympic Games to make the finals (top 8) in both Olympic diving events (10-meter platform & 3-meter springboard).  She was a six-time U.S. National team member, having switched her sports nationality to represent the United States for the last three years of her career, and competed at the 1996 U.S. Olympic trials in Indianapolis.   Ribot-Canales's first collegiate coaching position was head coach of diving at Cornell University in Ithaca from 2007-16. She was one of the only female coaches in the Ivy League during eight seasons. Her divers occupy most of Cornell's all-time top-10 list, and her top male diver was a double finalist and third-place finisher at the Ivy League Championships. During her years at Cornell, she had several finalists at the Ivy League Championships. She trained seven of the men's all-time top-10 finishers on the 3-meter board, eight of 10 male divers on the 1-meter board, five of 10 women in 3-meter and four of 10 in 1-meter.   Before her appointment at Cornell, Ribot-Canales coached her own USA Diving Club team, Team Olympia, in Miami, Florida, competing in the Florida Gold Coast Diving Association during 1996-2007. Having an eye for talent, she acquired her best diver, Bianca Alvarez who began training with her at the age of 12, after leaving a gymnastics career at a high level. By age 16 she was an age group National Champion, many times regional winner, Florida State High School Champion, and the most highly recruited athlete to college. Bianca went on to compete at the 2012 Olympic trials in Federal Way, Washington.   Prior to her arrival at Cortland, Ribot-Canales taught yoga full time. One of the places she taught was at the Student Life Center in Cortland from 2017-20.  

Tom Eickelberg, a professional triathlete who competes for Western Beef Racing in the Toyota U.S. Open Series, begins his third season as an assistant coach on the Cortland swimming and diving staff in 2014-15.Eickelberg was a three-sport student-athlete at Adelphi University, where he earned a bachelor’s degree in exercise science in 2011. He competed in swimming, cross country and track and field and currently holds five school records in the pool.