‘She was the pioneer’ coach Lil Shelton dies at age 90
Field hockey would not be the monumental success that it is in Severna Park, Anne Arundel County or even Maryland without Lil Shelton. No one who knew her well would dispute that.
From the first team at Severna Park in 1975 to her retirement in 2011, Shelton coached the Falcons to 31 county titles, 29 regional titles and 20 state championships, a mark unmatched by any Maryland coach in any sport, according to the Maryland Public Secondary Schools Athletic Association record book. In 616 games over 37 years, Shelton amassed a record of 544-60-10.
Lillian Weekley Shelton suffered a hemorrhagic stroke and died Sunday surrounded by family. She was 90.
USA Field Hockey Coach of the Year and Capital Gazette Coach of the Year many times over, Shelton is a member of the hall of fames at Severna Park High School, Anne Arundel County and National Field Hockey Association. She founded SPark indoor field hockey and the Field Hockey Junior League, and co-founded the Maryland State Field Hockey Association and the Maryland State Games.
Shelton was born in Atlanta, Georgia, on Dec. 28, 1930 and began her career teaching physical education in Dothan, Alabama, where she met her husband Vince. They started a family in Richmond, Virginia, before arriving in Severna Park in 1971.
She began her athletic involvement at Severna Park High in 1973 as the first school softball coach. She started a field hockey program two years later when she realized the girls had nothing to do in the fall.
Before she established the team, Shelton taught physical education at a time when the boys got the good gymnasium and the girls used what was left. One day, she found field hockey sticks in the closet and started teaching the sport in the school’s front lawn in which a magnolia tree grew in the middle.
Shelton swore her first teams learned to play so low because they had to duck under the trees.
In the early days of the program, the Falcons only had private school opponents in Anne Arundel and competed on inferior home fields.
“It was a fight from day one . ... She was constantly battling for that equality,” said Shelton’s daughter, Lorie Hankins, who played for Shelton’s first softball teams.
Shelton offered five-week summer hockey leagues long before she finally got a team into the Greater Severna Park Athletic Association Green Hornets. Wanting to raise the level of play in the county and not just Severna Park, she invited players from other high schools to help coach younger girls so the entire community could be exposed.
Hankins remembers hundreds of girls filling the field. Unheard of in elite clubs today, Shelton charged girls less than $20 for the entire summer and reinvested it into her program.
Among peers, Shelton was viewed as a rock star. Ginger Kincaid, who spent 39 years as coach at Glenelg before moving to Wilde Lake, dwelled inside Howard County and didn’t cross over until Shelton stepped up and created the statewide hockey coaches association, uniting the counties and instilling paths for girls to play hockey everywhere.
“She was the pioneer that we all followed. She was the barometer of how good your seasons, your teams were,” Kincaid said.
Finally being good enough to beat Severna Park in 2010 was the milestone that opened the gates for the Gladiators’ four future state championships. It was like being on the World Series stage, Kincaid said.