Phillylacrosse.com, Posted 4/13/23 – From Press Release
Black Bear Lacrosse Club is excited to announce the hiring of Valene Lawrence and Nikki Stevenson as its Assistant Directors for their Girls’ Lacrosse Travel Teams which will be launching for the 2023/24 year.
The Girls’ Cub Travel Program will hold tryouts in July 2023 for 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th-grade girls.
Leading the Girls Cub Program is current Upper Perkiomen High School Girls Varsity Head Coach Catie Sobotor who brings a wealth of knowledge, passion, and experience to her position as Cub Program director. She lives and coaches locally and believes strongly in growing the game of lacrosse and building better people and players through the game.
Learn More About the Girls Cub Program
SIGN UP FOR THE FREE CLINIC ON APRIL 16
Coach Val brings over 15 years of coaching experience including being the founder of the OBX Girls Lacrosse program in the Outer Banks of North Carolina. Black Bear is excited to have her knowledge and love of lacrosse to help launch the Girls’ Lacrosse program. Currently, she is coaching locally at Boyertown West MS and Boyertown Optimist Club. She loves working with players of all ages and teaching them the sport of lacrosse. Her goal is to make girls fall in love with lacrosse, while sharing her passion for lacrosse.
“We really loved getting to know Val after Catie shared her resume with us, she is passionate, knowledgeable, and excited about the opportunity to help us build our Girls Cub Program,” said Black Bear’s Owners, Bryan Churchey and Grady Wise, “Her values align so well with ours and she wants to serve and build this with us, she’s already started making a positive impact behind the scenes.”
Coach Nikki is ready to share her knowledge and life-long love of the sport. She has deep roots in the area having coached at Perkiomen Valley Youth and Dynamite Girls Lacrosse Club Program for many years as well as being the Lacrosse Manager for BSN Sports. She is excited to help from the very beginning because grassroots are extremely important and sets the tone for the following years. Her vision for the Girls’ Cubs Program is to be recognized by the local communities as a youth program that is dedicated to developing proper lacrosse skills, sportsmanship, and character in the players. Black Bear wishes to promote and honor the sport of lacrosse and create a genuine love of the game, while focusing on teamwork, culture and positive reinforcement of effort.
“We are very excited to have someone of Nikki’s experience and resume joining us. She is very involved locally and built many strong relationships with the community that was important to us. Her values and vision align with what we hope to build with our Girls Cub Program,” said the Black Bear’s Owners.
Sobotor and her newly formed staff have been very busy preparing for this weekend’s FREE CLINIC on Sunday, April 16th, and with over 30 girls already signed up they are ALL excited for the opportunity to share their values and vision for the Black Bear Girls Cub Program with the community. Black Bear will offer two FREE clinics for girls 1st-5th grade on April 16th and May 21st from 1-3 pm at Perkiomen Valley High School. This is a great opportunity for girls in grades 1-5 to have fun, build better fundamentals, and learn more about the Cub Program.
SIGN UP FOR THE FREE CLINIC ON APRIL 16
“It’s been impressive, she has been going out and finding the right people to join us in developing the Girls Cub Program the right way,” said Black Bear’s Owners. “Catie will be a fantastic leader of the program as she shares the same vision and core values Black Bear is built upon, we’re excited to get started with these free clinics and hope members of the community will come out to get a feel for what they can expect from us.”
So what is Black Bear’s and Sobotor’s Vision for the Girls Cub Lacrosse Program? Sobotor already has the plan written and the concrete is ready to be laid with tryouts set for July 2023 at Perkiomen Valley High School.
Black Bear Girls Cubs Program CORE Values:
- Sportsmanship: to learn a sense of fair play. We will not brag about victory and will be gracious in defeat. We will develop friendships with teammates and opponents alike, and we will respect officials.
- Respect: we will treat all others and all players as we would want to be treated.
- Effort: each member of BBGCP should try to perform to the best of their ability.
- Enjoyment: we want the lacrosse experience to be first and foremost FUN, satisfying and rewarding for all participants. We want all players after each season to look forward to playing lacrosse again the following season.
- Teamwork: each team will learn the importance of working together as a team to become successful.
- Commitment: we are committed to our coaches and our teammates. We understand that teamwork and the overall success of the team cannot be achieved without mutual commitment for all players to do well.
The focus of this program is to develop individual players’ fundamental skills in cradling, catching & passing, shooting, and ground balls. Individual offensive skills & individual defensive skills will be developed while going through the program. Players will also be taught team offensive strategies as well as team defensive strategies as they advance in the program.”
Learn more about the Black Bear Girls Cub Program at www.blackbearlacrosse.com .