NEW HAVEN, Conn.-- In conjunction with the 50th Anniversary of Title IX across the United States, the Central Atlantic Collegiate Conference (CACC) will honor former female student-athletes throughout the 2022-23 season. The first of 12 feature stories begins today, as the conference looks back at standout athletes Tianna Smith (Bloomfield College), Marisa Monasseri (Caldwell University) and Lauren Riiff (Chestnut Hill College), and scholar-athletes Samantha McClutchy (Dominican University), Emileigh Esposito (Felician University) and Anissia Fucci (Georgian Court University). The first feature also highlights the 2013-14 Bloomfield Women's Basketball team which claimed the CACC Championship that season.

Pioneers in women's athletics helped lead to the creation of Title IX in 1972, as the new law provided more opportunities for females across this land to compete in sports they love. The former CACC greats that will be profiled in this series took those early efforts to heart and turned themselves into some of the finest female student-athletes in college history.

Their greatness serves as inspiration for future generations of female student-athletes to not only meet their achievements but exceed them and continue the evolution of women's sports in the United States of America.