By Chris Goldberg
Phillylacrosse.com, Posted 11/18/10
Archbishop Carroll junior midfielder Maddy Lesher has mad e a verbal commitment to play Division I lacrosse at Loyola College.
Lesher was a key contributor on a Patriots team that won its 10th straight Catholic League championship and advanced to the quarterfinals of the state tournament in 2010. She plays for the Phantastix club team and played on Philly 2 in the National Tournament last May.
Lesher is the second Philly junior – along with Haverford High midfielder Katrina Geiger – to commit to Loyola in the past few days. Lesher also will follow Carroll midfielder Hannah Schmitt (senior) to Loyola and coach Jen Adams. Schmitt committed last year.
“Originally, I wasn’t looking at Loyola, but I went on my visit and when I stepped on campus it felt like home,” Lesher said. “I watched the team, and they play exactly the way I like to play.
“The coaching staff is amazing and I can’t wait to be coached by coach Adams.”
Lesher, who plans to major in Physical Therapy or Education, liked the small campus at Loyola.
“I looked at some big schools and I thought I wanted to go where they had a football team,” she said. “But on this campus the lacrosse teams are (treated) like the football team. It’s the big sport.”
Lesher also considered Penn State, Delaware, Notre Dame and James Madison.
Lesher is the fifth Carroll player to commit to a Division I college. Besides Schmitt, the others are senior goalie Nora McGeever (St. Joseph’s), senior midfielder Alyssa DiBona (Brown) and senior midfielder Bernadette Gennaro (Iona).
“I think we’ll do very well,” Lesher said. “We lost a lot of defenders, but I think we have a chance of going further than last year. We have a lot of girls that have committed and we have an awesome coach in coach (Lorraine) Beers.”
