By: Marty Stewart, Monday, April 2, 2018, TRIB-LIVE
Last year, the Fox Chapel girls lacrosse team compiled an 18-0 regular-season record, along with being section champ and WPIAL runner-up. The Foxes also made it to the quarterfinals of the PIAA playoffs.
Coach Katie Lundberg must replace a quintet of talented seniors as Meg McCrady, Mikayla D’Cunha, Ali Wessel, Kirsten Ovick and Caroline Smith have graduated.
The Foxes have a lot of talented starters returning in senior Kate Goodwin (midfield), juniors Marissa Hardiman (midfield), Rebecca Klaas (defense), Julie Scheffler (defense) and sophomores Mary Ellis (attack) and Sloan Rost (attack). They will be joined by returning letterwinners Margeaux Essey (senior, midfield), Makenzie Miller (junior, goalie), Emily Ben (Jr., defense), Makenna Blazer (junior, midfield), Lizzy Giuffre (sophomore, midfield) and Emily Scheffler (sophomore, midfield). Freshman Hannah Humes is expected to contribute in goal.
“We are athletic and fast,” Lundberg said. “However, we are very young from a minutes-played perspective. We are overloaded with midfielders and lack true attackers, and our team is very, very small. We also lost our draw specialist, so will need to fill that role.
“I think if our underclassmen filling those important roles can play with confidence and together, we can be successful. Although we are young, we have some returning players that have the ability to do really great things again for us this year.”
Lundberg thinks Shady Side Academy will be the team to beat.
“There is always the rivalry with SSA due to how close our schools are to each other,” he said. “With their new head coach and returning players, I expect them to be a great team.”
The Foxes opened their season with an 18-3 win over Latrobe on March 26. Ellis had four goals and five assists, and Rost scored eight goals. Hardiman scored three goals and added an assist, Blazer scored twice, Giuffre scored a goal and Humes had one save in goal.