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Andover High girls soccer coach Meghan Lynch Matson will be inducted into the Punchard/Andover High Hall of Fame on Saturday night. She is a phys ed teacher at the South Elementary School in Andover, the same school she attended.
ANDOVER — The Meghan Lynch Matson influence with Andover High girls soccer has been an impressive one. And long, too, as a student-athlete and then as its coach.
As in 30 years.
First as a goalkeeper, helping lead Andover to two Merrimack Valley Conference titles in her three years as a starter, earning an MVC-best 10 shutouts in the fall of 2011 before heading off to Boston University, where he still lingers in the record book – second all-time in saves (247) and fourth in shutouts (19.9).
Then making her mark as coach, beginning in 2002 as a co-head coach and in 2004 as the head coach, with an overall record of 220-11-70 over 21 seasons, including seven MVC titles, six Coach of the Year Awards and 2006 EMass Coach of the Year Award.
Meghan Lynch Matson
Meghan Lynch Matson, right, poses with fellow Andover High soccer captain Sue Cookson. Matson headed to Boston University while Cookson starred at Merrimack.
But one of her most prized pupils, Lauren Pien, now the head coach for Endicott College women’s soccer, said it was last November at the Andover High Alumni Game that opened her eyes to Matson’s influence.
“It was amazing, so many players from previous decades showed up and it was so much fun,” said Pien, who starred on one of arguably Andover’s best Matson teams in 2011. “She was a great coach. She found a way to have such an impact on us as players, but also to maintain that after we left Andover. That alumni game was special, because of Meg.”
Hall of Famer
Meghan Matson
On Saturday night she was inducted into the Punchard/Andover High Athletics Hall of Fame as both a player and coach.
Matson is an Andover lifer, not only coming through the system, but returning there as a teacher – she’s been a physical education teacher at the South School since 2002 – and coach, also raising her family here.
Matson played three sports at Andover High, more focused on basketball until the soccer bug took over.
“My dad was born and raised here,” she noted. “It’s comforting, being from this town, which I love, and knowing, it seems, almost everybody. I’ve just always had a strong connection with the town.”
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Meghan Matson with her husband, Cmdr. David Matson, and their sons, Jack, 8, and Tucker, 3.
The married mother of two boys – both nationally ranked skiers, Andover High freshman, Jack (moguls), and sixth grader, Tucker (free style) – has connection with the event on Saturday night.
Her grandfather, Raymond Lynch, was a former Punchard High great from the early 1940s and an inductee. In fact, Lynch’s dad, David Lynch, was his father’s presenter in 1971.
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Andover High girls soccer coach Meghan Lynch Matson will be inducted into the Punchard/Andover High Hall of Fame on Saturday night. She is a phys ed teacher at the South Elementary School in Andover, the same school she attended.
Matson’s return to Andover as a coach occurred after left B.U. and became an assistant coach at Bucknell University for three years.
“I originally thought I wanted to be a college coach, long-term, but while there I realized there isn’t really a good balance of life because that I was looking for,” she said. “There was an opportunity to return to Andover and I was able to use my teaching degree.”
Matson met her future husband, David Matson, at a wedding at Bucknell. He joined her in Andover and, well, the rest is history.
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