Q&A with Robert Morris University Women’s Hockey Assistant Coach Keri Clougherty

When readers of The Ice Garden last heard from Keri Clougherty, it was during the 2025 Hockey Humanitarian Award finalists series when she was playing at Boston College. The then-senior was named a finalist for the award, finished up her collegiate career with the Eagles, and also made an appearance at the 2025 PWHL Entry Draft in support of former BC teammate Abby Newhook. 

After she graduated, Clougherty was offered an assistant coach position with Robert Morris University’s women’s hockey team. There, she's worked with the team’s defensive core, led initiatives in skill development, and guided the players in community outreach.

Clougherty talked with The Ice Garden about her new coaching career, what she's learned so far in her new role, and how she aims to keep in touch with her BC community.

THE ICE GARDEN: It's already been six months since you first joined the RMU coaching staff. How did the decision to transition to coaching come to be? What made you choose RMU?

KERI CLOUGHERTY: It was right after my season – my career ended and I don't think that's talked about enough of, like, what do [you] do after you decide hockey is over? My plan was to keep playing, and I [said] in the spring I thought I was going to keep playing. But as the weeks went on, I had this gut feeling that I wanted to end hockey playing with my best friends. I'm ready to take a step back from playing. I started kind of exploring what it actually looks like to be a coach and where there were openings and all of that stuff. I was going through the process with RMU and I was honestly excited to see what the process was like. I was still in school and I was preparing to graduate and I was like, this would be really cool. I was talking with their staff at the time and I was like, this is awesome. I wanted to go to a place that I cared about and that I wanted to be at that had similar morals and values, and what they stand for, what the program has been through, all of that stuff, I was like, this would be a cool thing to be a part of because I was going to be spending so much time there. 

TIG: How has it been getting started with RMU?

CLOUGHERTY: I started a week, maybe weeks after graduation and I started recruiting right away. I've been learning by doing and by asking [head coach] Logan [Bittle] and [assistant coach] Liam [Cavanagh] so many questions a day, but they never make it feel like a burden. They're like, "no, go do it. You have questions? Okay, I'll answer it, then go do it." That’s what has been so fun is how comfortable I feel because they're just supporting me. I didn't think that's where I would be, if you asked me this time last year, where I would be, I probably wouldn't have had an answer for you. But now I'm here six months in and it's been awesome.

TIG: There are a lot of similarities between you helping out in your community back when you were at BC and now as a coach with the Colonials.

CLOUGHERTY: I remember saying that when I was going through my process [of becoming a coach], I was like, I feel I'm going to be making a difference in people's lives, but not in a drastic way. It's in those little conversations that I've found to love with players, the little check-ins that sometimes don't even have to do with hockey. I think hockey's the add-on sometimes. Coaches know everything about your life because you want them to, if you feel comfortable around them.

So it's been really fun to mix the community service part of it and how much that has been a part of my life and actually honestly doing it as a career with a little bit of hockey mixed in. It's a good time.

TIG: You’re only a few months removed from playing in college, how has the coaching aspect of being on the ice and coaching the defense been?

CLOUGHERTY: It's been so fun to be on the bench. I genuinely get excited to come to the rink to go on the ice every single day, no matter what time it is. Earlier today, I was on the ice for probably two hours, whether it was doing skills or video or whatever it is. Hockey being a passion of mine and having very much like a hockey brain and knowing the game and having so much fun with the game, it's been fun to translate coming out of playing and then into coaching. Whether it's playing the same systems or different systems, or bringing my own touch into things, or a player showing me something that I've never seen, or coaching them on this aspect that they've never been coached about before, it's been a good mix of bringing some fun and fresh ideas.

TIG: How so?

CLOUGHERTY: You definitely have a bird's eye view, which I think is good for me to think about because when you're playing, you're playing and you're only focusing on yourself and how to benefit the team and all of this stuff, but having a coaching lens and even just working with the defense, it's how do I make these eight girls a unit and a family and then create that for the whole 25 players on the roster? It's been fun to create a little family on the defense side.

That's my outlook on it is to know that I want my players to know that I care about them. I'm here to support them, make them better, make the team better and that's through showing up every day with a smile. It's doing the extra work that I want to do. It's checking in about life and school and everything that I have going on. It's definitely been  fun to translate what worked for me, what didn't work for me when I was a player, and learn from my coaches. It's been cool to take some of their ideas and ideologies and kind of mold it into mine too.

Keri Clougherty Lends a Hand On and Off the Boston College Campus

Even as a busy athlete, BC’s Keri Clougherty still makes time to help others in various ways.

The Ice GardenGiselle Velazquez

TIG: In your story for the Hockey Humanitarian Award finalists series, it opened with how you make time in your busy schedule as a student-athlete to help others. Are you still as busy now as a coach? What is your routine like?

CLOUGHERTY: I don't know if people realize how much goes on on the coaching side, it's not just drawing up – not that I thought it was, but it's definitely a lot. I've definitely found a good routine. I love being at the rink. So, I kind of spend as much time as I can here… watching practice back, planning practice, doing some work [to] prep for the weekend, also just checking in on our players and academics and all of that stuff and going off like why I wanted to be here. The girls on our team are so involved in the community, so it's helping them find ideas. There's definitely a lot of moving pieces that if you don't love it and love being at the rink, then you're probably in the wrong spot. Sometimes I don't even realize what time it is and I'm like, oh my gosh, I've been here for so long, but it means I like what I'm doing.

TIG: What have you learned about yourself through this first half of the season being at RMU and being a coach? What's something that you probably didn't realize that you were really good at or didn't know you had within you?

CLOUGHERTY: It's a testament to the setting that I'm in that it's such a welcoming setting that you want to be the best and you're going to do that through learning and doing. It's been really cool to see me being able to go for it, where I don't think I've never not done that. You can tell I'm very outgoing, all of that stuff, but coming into my first real job and starting my career, it's been fun to kind of jump all in. That is because of this place that I'm in. It's a great place, a welcoming place.

It has the competitive aspect and viewpoint, but it's through, again, that support and that care for the program and the people. It's been fun to go for it and learn and figure out what works and what doesn't.

TIG: Have you been able to get out and be part of your community and reach out to others, similar to what you were doing when you were back in BC?

CLOUGHERTY: I haven't done anything too much on an individual basis, but it's been cool to help. The girls will come to me because I oversee the community service hours on the staff and I check in and help them set up whatever they can. Our staff is really hands-on, so if they have an idea, I'm like, let's do it. We've reached out to hospitals and set some things up for that over break. We have a Big Sister Little Sister program with the Penn's Elite U-10 team, so every player on our team gets paired with a U-10 player on the Penn's Elite team, and when they come to our games, they'll get to read the starting lineups in the locker room.

The girls definitely spearhead all the activities and I help wherever I can. That's also something that I was looking for when I was going through my process of where I was going to be and what I was going to be doing for work. I want to be a coach, but there's so much more and I got to learn the value of that being at BC and it quite literally changed my life of how much I got to work with people and how awesome those experiences were. Coming here, it's been cool to see how much the girls are involved. It's not because they have to be, it's because they want to be.

TIG: What do you hope that the players on the team will gain from doing this in the rest of the season, the rest of their time there?

CLOUGHERTY: Being a Division I student-athlete is not easy. You get kind of blinders on of how much you're doing in a day and how tired you are and how sore you are and all of that stuff. But then, for example, our Little Sisters program, when they see their little sister walk into the locker room and their eyes light up and you can hear her [say] the players all have three sticks, like the small details that are everyday details to us and to our players, it puts so much into perspective. Even if our players are going into that game and they're sore, it doesn't matter because their little sister is in the stands cheering them on. I know what it's like to play 35 games a season for four years. I definitely try to keep that perspective in and kind of put things into perspective for the girls. It's cool to see that they care so much about the community and about the next generation. It definitely makes the harder days at the rink a little easier when you have a bunch of little 10-year-olds screaming your name and all of that stuff.

TIG: Have you been able to keep in touch with everyone back home with Newton Athletes Unlimited and The Campus School since you’ve been away?

CLOUGHERTY: They are still some of my biggest fans. I obviously still talk to a bunch of my teammates at BC who are still there. I was on the phone with one of them and they were on their way to Newton Athletes Unlimited and I said "tell everyone I said hello." I'm just so glad that that means so much to the BC team and it means so much to the athletes skating at Newton Athletes Unlimited.

I check in here and there if I can. At the campus school, I'm going to go back when I'm home for Christmas just to say hello. My advisor when I was an intern there, who is like a mentor to me at this point, We'll talk every now and then. I can never repay her for the experience that she allowed me to have there.

I think about them so much… some special places that I will keep in contact with, hopefully for the rest of my life.