By Stone Freeman
Assistant Athletic Director, Media Relations

KINGSTON, R.I. - For Hailey LaRosa, Rhode Island Track and Field runs in the family. Literally.

The fourth-year Ram is a second-generation member of the Rhode Island Women's Cross Country and Track & Field programs. Her father, Paul LaRosa '98, and mother, Erin (Moon) LaRosa '01, competed for the Rams during their collegiate days.

Her father, Paul, competed for legendary Rhode Island Men's Cross Country and Track & Field head coach John Copeland. He and his brother, Mark LaRosa '01, were both members of the 4x1500m team that still holds the program's outdoor best time of 16:17.14, set March 26, 1999.

Her mother, Erin, spent her college years in Kingston running for current Women's Cross Country and Track & Field head coach Laurie Feit-Melnick and associate head coach John Melnick. The family legacy doesn't stop with LaRosa's parents. Her uncle, Mark, married Heather (Whitmore) LaRosa '01, who was named the Atlantic 10 Women's Cross Country Rookie of the Year in 1997.

LaRosa's parents have not made frequent trips to campus, given they experienced the school as student-athletes themselves. They do, however, attend just about every meet to see their daughter compete. And while LaRosa has carved her own path, the family lineage remains firmly intact. She now competes for her mother and aunt's former coaches.

"Sometimes both Coach [Laurie] Feit and Coach [John] Melnick call me the wrong name," LaRosa said. "Coach Melnick has sent out emails referring to me as Heather, and sometimes Coach Feit calls me Erin."

When it came time to choose a school to spend her collegiate years at, LaRosa initially thought coming to her parents' alma mater might not be in her best interest.

"Are people going to think I came here [Rhode Island] because I had a way in?" LaRosa said while looking back on her college commitment. "What if I wasn't good enough to be at URI but I had gotten in because they knew my family?"

With those questions spinning in her mind during the fall of her senior year at Newburyport High School in Newburyport, Mass., LaRosa began to weigh her options. She was being recruited by several other Division I institutions in addition to Rhode Island. During the recruiting process, the uncertainty of potentially spending the next four years in Kingston turned into something else. LaRosa saw opportunity.
 

A standout distance runner in high school, LaRosa won her team's distance award each year from 2021 through 2023 while captaining the cross country, indoor and outdoor track teams during her final two seasons at Newburyport. LaRosa had experienced the top of the podium. She and her parents saw an opportunity to spend the next four years at a college that would test her limits.

LaRosa had conversations with some college coaches that centered around her being one of the team's best runners during her first season.

"One college coach told me I would be top five on the team my freshman season," LaRosa recalled. "I didn't want that. My parents didn't want that. I had done it in high school. I wanted to be at a place that challenged me."

Along with the ambition of competing at a high level and meeting her own expectations, LaRosa emphasized feel while she was being recruited. While taking official visits and overnight stays, she began to picture herself on college campuses and envision what the next four years would be like. Some visits felt better than others.

The best came in October 2022, when she spent the night in Kingston with then-freshman Olivia Skapczynski. "It was awesome," LaRosa said about her first experience spending the night on campus. She and Skapczynski would go on to become teammates and, in LaRosa's words, "best friends."

After arriving on campus in fall 2023, LaRosa spent her first year sidelined from competition and utilized a redshirt. Since then, over the last three seasons, LaRosa has relished every opportunity to challenge herself and compete for Rhode Island.

It's her drive to seek out and overcome challenges that has allowed her to fall in love with cross country.

"I prefer cross country, and I might be the only person on the team to say that," LaRosa said about competing across both cross country and track events. "When running cross, I feel like you don't know where you are. I like that part. You aren't counting laps. I feel like I do better with an obstacle in my way."

LaRosa finds the same chase when competing in the 3000m steeplechase during the outdoor track season.

"When I'm on a flat track that doesn't have a steeple on it, I feel like it's so slow," LaRosa said. "I need a hill, steeple, or obstacle in front of me."

Over the last three seasons, competing for Feit-Melnick and choosing Rhode Island have worked well for LaRosa. She emphasized how Feit-Melnick saw potential in her as a high schooler and how that belief has helped her reach new heights.

"She [Feit-Melnick] gives people opportunities you might not get at other places."

Though the family ties to Rhode Island Cross Country and Track & Field are strong, LaRosa has carved her own path while at Rhody. She owns the program's sophomore record in the steeplechase with a time of 11:17.66 from 2025 and last year ran the eighth-fastest time in program history in the event, finishing in 11:04.17.

LaRosa and the Rams continue their season at the Paul Short Invitational at Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pa. on Friday, Oct. 2. The meet begins at 11 a.m.