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Betty Ann Kempf Townsley
With over three decades of college coaching experience, and most of that coming at the Division I level, Betty Ann Kempf Townsley enters her 17th campaign at West Chester University in the fall of 2023.
During her tenure in Southeastern PA, Kempf Townsley has steered West Chester University to four Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference titles (2007, 2009, 2010 and 2022) and four straight PSAC East crowns, before the conference switched to a one-division format. Along the way, she has mentored four conference rookies of the year (Sarah Oswald - 2007; Lyndsie Bernardini - 2009; Kaitlynn Haughey - 2021 and Faith Matter - 2022), four players of the year (Lauren Boyer - 2008; Oswald - 2010; Walsh - 2016; Jenny Bail - 2019 and Kaitlynn Haughey - 2022), two defensive players of the year (Julia Kirkpatrick - 2017 and Hayley McGee - 2022) and 15 United Soccer All-Americans, including six first-team honorees (Brittany Yetter (2008), Sarah Oswald (2010), Scarlet Walsh (2016), Kaitlynn Haughey (2022), Kiley Kergides (2022) and Hayley McGee (2022).
She has authored a stellar 238-53-34 record overall in 16 competitive seasons at WCU and is the school’s all-time winningest women’s soccer head coach. Her overall record in 37 competitive seasons as an NCAA head coach stands at 382-253-60.
During her time at West Chester, the Golden Rams have been ranked as high as second nationally and have won the Atlantic Region title six times (2007, 2010, 2012, 2014, 2017 and 2022) and played for the region championship 10 times. Kempf Townsley has reached the NCAA Division II Tournament all 16 years at West Chester University that the NCAA has conducted a postseason.
Kempf Townsley has landed 69 student-athletes on the PSAC all-league squad in her 16 years on South Campus. Ten of those all-leaguers won a major award as well (Athlete of the Year, Defensive Player of the Year, Rookie of the Year) while she, herself, has walked away with coach of the year plaudits three times (2009, 2016 and 2022). Her first two years at the school, she did not lose a conference game. In fact, she dropped just two league contests in her first four years while winning the championship three times. The 2016 campaign saw the Golden Rams run the table, going 16-0-0. It is the most conference wins in a single season in PSAC history while also marking just the fourth time ever that a school finished the league slate unbeaten and untied.
The 2022 season was a magical run for the Golden Rams that culminated in a trip to the NCAA Division II Festival in Seattle, Wash., where the national semifinals and championship were held. Kempf Townsley and her group defeated Ferris State, 2-1, before falling to Western Washington in the national championship game by an identical score. The team's 23 wins tied the school record set in 2006 when West Chester made its only other appearance in the national semifinals. Seven players were named to the all-league squad while West Chester swept the major awards by taking Player of the Year, Defensive Player of the Year, Rookie of the Year and Coach of the Year honors in the PSAC in 2022. Five Golden Rams were named all-region and four of those went on to be knighted as Division II All-America - the most recipients in a single season for the school. Kempf and her coaching staff were honored with the Atlantic Region Coaching Staff of the Year award last season as well. in May 2023, the Southeastern Pennsylvania Soccer Hall of Fame awarded Kempf Townsley the Charlotte Moran Award as the Female Coach of the Year. Ironically, her husband and former West Chester University women's soccer head coach, Ed Townsley, was inducted into that organization's hall of fame on the same day.
Before taking over West Chester's program in 2007, Kempf Townsley spent her previous 13 years at Seton Hall University in the Big EAST Conference where she guided the women’s soccer program since its inception in 1994, before stepping down after the 2006 campaign. She built the Pirates into a reputable program, which was competitive in the Big EAST - one of the top women’s soccer conferences in the nation.
With a reputation as an outstanding recruiter, Kempf Townsley brought a diverse group of student-athletes to Seton Hall. One of Kempf Townsley’s most noteworthy recruits was Kelly Smith, the NCAA’s career leader in points and goals per game, and a former star for England’s National Team.
Kempf Townsley’s 13-year record at Seton Hall was 103-118-17, with four winning seasons and five berths in the conference tournament, including a pair of appearances in the semifinals (1997, 1999). She tutored15 all-conference players at Seton Hall, and was the Big EAST Coach of the Year in 1997. Smith won the loop's player of the year award three times (1997, 1998, 1999) and rookie of the year once (1997). In 2002 and 2003, Kempf Townsley's squads were awarded the College Academic Team Award by the Big EAST.
In 1999, Seton Hall went 11-9 and reached the semifinals of the Big EAST Championship for the second time while Kelly Smith was the nation’s leading scorer for the second year in a row and the program’s first All-America selection.
In 1998, Seton Hall stunned the college soccer world when the unranked Pirates defeated No. 2 Notre Dame, ending a 37-game unbeaten streak for Notre Dame against Big EAST foes. The upset vaulted the Pirates into the Top 20 for the first time in school history with a ranking of 17th in the nation. Seton Hall finished the campaign with an 11-6-1 record and Kempf Townsley was named the 1998 New Jersey Coach of the Year for the second consecutive season.
Kempf Townsley guided the 1997 Pirates to their best season in school history with a 14-5 record and a 9-2 mark in the Big EAST, with conference losses only to NCAA Final Four teams Notre Dame and Connecticut. Seton Hall made its first-ever appearance in the Big EAST Tournament, reaching the semifinals as the third seed. Among the highlights of that banner season was a school-record nine-match winning streak.
Kempf Townsley was very familiar with the task of building college soccer programs from scratch. She started the women's team at LaSalle University in 1986, before doing the same thing at Seton Hall eight years later. During her eight-year tenure with the Explorers, she amassed a 41-82-9 overall record. She was named the 1991 Eastern Pennsylvania Coach of the Year.
A well-recognized figure in Pennsylvania soccer, Kempf Townsley guided the Pennsylvania Olympic Developmental Girls Under-18 squad to a semifinal berth during the summer of 1994 in the world’s largest soccer tournament, the Gothia Cup, held in Gothenburg, Sweden. She also coached the Eastern Pennsylvania Olympic Developmental Girls Under-19 team in one of the world’s premier women’s tournaments held in Bremen, Germany, in the summer of 1995.
In May 2001, she was inducted into the Philadelphia Old Timers Soccer Hall of Fame, becoming only the second woman to earn that distinction. She also holds membership in the Southeastern Pennsylvania Soccer Hall of Fame.
Very active in the community, she created the Eddie Polec Memorial Soccer Camp in her native city of Philadelphia, which was held for over 20 years. Kempf Townsley started the camp in the summer of 1995 to establish a scholarship fund at St. Cecilia School in Philadelphia in memory of Polec.
A 1982 graduate of Immaculata University, Kempf Townsley is married to Ed Townsley, who coached West Chester University’s women’s soccer squad in 1997 and 1998.
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