HERTZOG: Seniors’ unity so strong, Owen J. Roberts couldn’t be matched

UNIVERSITY PARK >> There were times this spring opponents were left feeling like the Owen J. Roberts girls lacrosse team is so good it’s unfair.

They’re right in a way. The Wildcats do have a competitive advantage.

That’s the best way to describe a starting lineup with eight seniors who all competed on the same No. 2 nationally-ranked NXT Black 2023 team throughout the past six years under the same head coach, David Schlesinger, blending club and scholastic play in total harmony.

“I think this is every coach’s dream,” Schlesinger said of the arrangement.

Throughout the spring, OJR’s level of dominance was unrivaled — its average margin of victory is better than 13 goals. A clock with the label “Running Time” on their pre-game t-shirts wasn’t out of place. It was a regular occurrence amid a 27-1 campaign.

Opposing teams lamented not being able to keep pace with the Wildcats and the continuity of their senior class. But to cry foul is to undersell the commitment it took to stick together from the time they joined forces in elementary school.

With the mutation of club sports and high school teams becoming a student-athlete’s ‘other’ team, the not-so-secret sauce of this year’s Wildcats is the lack of an ‘other.’

For the foundation of this group, it’s one and only.

“Six of us came together in fifth grade and tried out when NXT first started as a program,” midfielder Alexa Vogelman said. “We all tried out for the 2023 team and all ended up making it. From then on, we loved the program, loved the team, loved playing together.

“We all played Coventry together in second or third grade so we wanted to continue together. From the beginning, we found the love of the sport and shared the same passion for lacrosse.”

 

Sports brought them together and the relationships followed.

“We all bonded over sports, but then it developed into pure friendships and it’s made us excel,” attacker Blakely Doyle said. “We have really good chemistry because we’ve been playing together forever. Knowing how people react to things, you know what to say in the moment, how to handle the bad moments and how to bring each other up.”

The group that already featured Vogelman, Doyle, midfielders Gabbi Koury and Colby Wasson, and defensemen Rachel Sbei and Avery Wentzel, grew to eight when Ava Clemson and Cailin Harrington joined.

“I met them through basketball and they were encouraging me to play lacrosse,” Clemson recalled. “Going into it was definitely nerve-wracking because I knew how good they were. But I knew they were my friends, knew they had my back and would help me through everything.

“(Cailin and I) both came into it and they were with open arms, so welcoming, a family and I loved being a part of it. We all do.”

Schlesinger came on board the summer of 2017, ‘reluctantly’ at first.

“I had only coached teams in their most recruitable year at the clubs I coached at, South Jersey Select and Ultimate in New Jersey,” he said. “I knew I wanted to make a move and got introduced to the director at NXT and she said, ‘I want to put you with the 23s.’ They were rising seventh-graders. I said, ‘I don’t know if I can do middle school.’

“She was like, ‘You don’t understand. They might chronologically be seventh graders, but this is THE group.’ I went to a spring league camp at Penn Charter and that was my first with them. I was completely taken with their athleticism and their competitiveness. You could tell even then, they didn’t want to lose, and they were very fast and athletic.”

Schlesinger has gone to great lengths — literally. He resides in New Jersey yet has coached the OJR high school team since 2019.

“(Former OJR coach Amanda Kammes) had to relocate and some of the parents of the 23s, some of whom had older daughters in high school, came to me and said they wanted me to come coach at Owen J. At the time I was the coach at Central Bucks East and we had won our first Suburban One League championship, but I felt I’d kind of maxed out there.”

“It added another 30-40 minutes to my commute, so I got an electric car and decided to make it work.”

Schlesinger had the ability to commit on both fronts having retired from his first career in investment banking. Returning to the sport after his own playing career at Harriton and Colgate University, he’s coached girls programs since 2002 with stops including Wissahickon and CB East in Pa. In 2021, he was named HS Coach of the Year by USA Lacrosse.

Koury and Vogelman have starred in soccer and lacrosse throughout their multi-sport OJR careers. The Florida-bound Koury, who recently became a three-time All-American, spent the postseason building on the all-time OJR scoring record despite losing out on the 2020 season due to the pandemic. Also a 100-goal scorer and three-time All-American, Syracuse signee Vogelman was consistently the finisher to what Koury started, on the draw and creating goals.

And yet the other six are also destined for NCAA Division I play, fellow All-American Wasson (Xavier), as well as Doyle (Liberty), Clemson (Butler), Harrington (Villanova) and Wentzel (Duquesne). The team’s ninth senior, Kalli Mullen, will also play at the next level at Haverford College.

The commitment to team above stats is proven with players like Clemson and Doyle, who may not rack up the stats in the same way as Koury and Vogelman, but have the quality to be recruited to NCAA’s top tier.

“Scoring goals is fun, winning is fun, but we know that we all contribute as a team,” Doyle said. “Being ‘the star’ isn’t the most important thing to us, it’s just working together as a team and getting better and better each day.”

After shortcomings in the previous two years — OJR’s senior class was unable to get past the quarterfinal round in districts and states in 2021 and 2022 — they did a lot of course correction since. It began with a 25-3 club season that garnered a No. 2 ranking by Inside Lacrosse. The good times rolled all the way through this spring while turning aside all challengers in the PAC, district and state in Class 3A.

Even with state championship trophy in hand, Saturday carried a tinge of sadness.

“This is the last time we’re going to play for one another. All season we’ve preached, ‘Do it for one another,’” Vogelman said. “… It’s the conclusion of our journey together. But when we look back on it we have a lot to be grateful for, for the friendships we’ve built and the success we’ve had.”

Inseparable for years, their time together ended Saturday. Yet they’ll continue to be what they’ve always been to each other — only now from afar.

“We’re each other’s biggest fans,” Vogelman said.