The newest addition to the Harvard women's ice hockey team's coaching staff is not a new face on the block in Harvard athletics.

Assistant Coach Kate Schutt, affectionately referred to as "Schuttie" by her teammates, has contributed three years to the women's ice hockey and lacrosse programs.

The senior was awarded the John Dooley Award in ice hockey after the 1997-98 season, and named First-Team All-Ivy in 1998 in lacrosse as the top goalie in the league.

Why isn't she competing this year? Kate Schutt is competing in a different arena--the music business.

Schutt came to Harvard from the Taft School in the fall of 1993. Schutt then left Harvard in the summer of 1995 to enroll into the Berklee College of Music in Boston.

"I love music, it is a huge part of who I am," Schutt says. "Harvard can't give me what I need to pursue the career I want in music."

She is mainly a jazz guitarist, plays some folk and acoustic rock and also sings a bit.

Schutt appreciates the level of education Harvard has to offer, but for such a competitive business as the music industry, she needed to immerse herself in her guitar training. In two years, Schutt accomplished the academic equivalent of three years' worth of work at Berklee.

"If you are going to do it, do it whole-heartedly," Schutt says.

Berklee College of Music is 15 percent women and was only 10 percent in 1995 when Schutt arrived.

"Most of the women at the college are singers," Schutt says. "The guitar department itself is almost exclusively men."

She explains her pursuit as a constant battle--having to compete everyday, much like she did in athletics.

"I definitely approach music like an athlete," says Schutt. "I won't accept mediocrity, I won't be happy with anything less than the best."

Her return to Harvard athletics, she explains, was just as refreshing of a change as was leaving in the first place.

"It was great to finally use my body again, to be a physical person," Schutt says.