Iona University President Seamus Carey, Ph.D., and Athletic Director Matthew Glovaski announced the addition of women’s acrobatics & tumbling and men’s lacrosse as the schools’ 22nd and 23rd intercollegiate sports.  

The goal for both sports is to be up and running for the 2024-2025 school year.  

Therefore, the school is aiming to have a coaching staff in place to begin recruiting next year to be ready for competition in two years’ time.  

These new additions to the Iona intercollegiate sports program follow Iona’s launch of a Club Sports program and a championship winning esports club.  

Iona has nearly doubled the campus space available after acquiring Concordia College, a 28-acre campus in Bronxville, which means they have additional field space and performance venues for the addition of new sports.  

The acrobatics and tumbling team will involve several different disciplines of gymnastics which include the athletic aspects of competitive cheerleading.  

During competition, individuals and small groups execute acrobatic lifts, tosses and tumbles. The format was first introduced to the NCAA in 2009.  

Athletes for the acrobatics & tumbling team are primarily recruited from the various disciplines of gymnastics and cheerleading, but also from multi-sports athletes, diving and weightlifters.  

Iona will also be making their Men’s Club Lacrosse Team (MLCA) into a full intercollegiate NCAA team in 2024.  

Lacrosse was first introduced to Iona in 2022 as a club sports team as they finished with a 3-5 record playing as a member of the MCLA Division II Continental Lacrosse Conference (CLC), in the National Collegiate Lacrosse League (NCLL).  

“It is our mission to create opportunities at Iona University for students to achieve their highest potential both inside and outside of the classroom,” said President of Iona University Seamus Carey Ph.D., according to an article by the National Collegiate Acrobatics & Tumbling association.  

The men’s lacrosse team will compete in the Metro Atlantic Athletics Conference (MAAC), which currently features Canisius College, Long Island University, Manhattan College, Marist College, Mount St. Mary’s University, Quinnipiac University, Sacred Heart University, Siena College, Virginia Institute of Technology and Wagner College.  

The addition of a men’s lacrosse team at Iona means that for the very first time a Division I men’s lacrosse program will be in Westchester County; there has been a women’s program since 2005. 

“[Lacrosse] is a sport that you certainly hear a lot about over the years, and given our location, there has always been questions and an interest in the program,” said Matthew Glovaski, athletics director at Iona University, according to an article by lohud.  

“For us, the ability to move into the MAAC, which has terrific men’s lacrosse and really competitive programs, and the fact that we’re in this great recruiting hotbed that we can really leverage, it’s a really exciting day and we’re looking forward to hitting the ground running,” Glovaski said.