Following the departure of Chris Quinlan, Brian Patenaude was named the new head coach for the Saugus girls’ lacrosse program.
Patenaude, who was the head coach of the Santa Monica girls’ lacrosse team from 2018 to 2026, is set to coach at Saugus High School and has goals to bring the Centurions to a California Interscholastic Federation championship.
“I truly believe that this team is going to win CIF either next year, otherwise within the next few years,” Patenaude said in an interview with The Signal. “With some of the people I’ve met and spoken with, they’re all in. And that’s the other piece that’s really important to me.”
Patenaude is expected to coach alongside Madison Pena, who was with the previous coaching staff under Quinlan that led the Centurions to a second-place finish in the Foothill League with a 15-4 overall record.
The Centurions made an appearance in the Division 2 Southern Section playoffs last year after the regular season and recorded a postseason win over Culver City in the first round with Sam Weathers and Caroline Doran earning all-CIF honors.
Both Weathers and Doran are expected to return next year and work under Patenuade as he looks forward to building upon the team’s previoussuccess with his own philosophies.
“I’m going to bring in on how I can keep moving them forward even higher,” he said. “It’s a young team but a talented team, so it’s exciting to see where we’re going with everyone coming back.”
The move to Saugus High School was a long time coming for the new coach after he moved to Santa Clarita in 2020 but remained at Santa Monica High School.
Patenaude said he commuted daily from the Santa Clarita Valley to Santa Monica and with the opportunity to work in the community where he resides, it makes life easier for him and his family.
“The goal was to ultimately come up here. My wife was born and raised in Santa Clarita and graduated from Saugus, which makes it more special,” he said. “And ultimately, what’s really important to me is working in a community that I can also live in and be part of with the school.”
Patenaude has already hit the ground running for next season and laid down the goals with the returners on the team and to grow the program and the sport across all levels.
“I’m going to learn a lot about the team this year, especially this fall,” he said. “I want to make sure that some of the younger players are learning from the older players and vice versa. You don’t have to be the best player to be valuable on the team. I want to make it fun for them and fun can be by winning as well with succeeding on the field.”
