Julie Gardner, a recent graduate of Severna Park, has plenty to play for in the Under Armour All-American Girls Lacrosse Game at Towson?s Johnny Unitas Stadium on Saturday.
Like who?s going to get top bunk next month.
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“My college roommate, Chelsea Robinson, will be on the North team,” Gardner, who was selected to the South squad, said with a laugh. “I?ll try to get those bragging rights.”
Robinson of Putnam, N.Y., and Gardner, who will play for Virginia next season, are just two of the nation?s top 44 college-bound players selected to participate in country?s most prestigious All-Star game. The 6 p.m. game precedes the boys? All-American Game at 8, when the best recent graduates from across the country punctuate the sport?s showcase.
Under Armour?s foray into featuring the best the sport has to offer beginsearlier in the day, when a boys and a girls team from D.C., Maryland, Philadelphia and New Jersey compete in a two-game tournament to see which state boasts the nation?s best underclassmen.
Gardner, The Examiner?s Player of the Year, has been keeping busy this summer by coaching a SPLax club team ? made up of mostly seventh graders who live in Severna Park?s school district ? and getting in shape to play in college.
Gardner?s selection to the All-Star Game came a year after she was unable to try out for the underclassman team because of a stress fracture in her right foot.
But after posting 53 goals and 23 assists in leading the top-ranked Falcons to their second straight 20-0 record and Class 4A/3A title, she was an easy choice.
Gardner, however, isn?t the only Cavalier who will take the field on Saturday. Five other standouts are headed to seventh-ranked Virginia, including four from the South team ? midfielders Caroline Cochran (St. Mary?s) and Josie Owen (Severn) and defender (Annie Taylor (St. Stephen?s/St. Agnes).
“I?ve played with them in a few tournaments, but during the season I am always playing against them,” Gardner said. “It?s awesome because you get to play with and against so many good players.”
The South team will be coached by John Carroll?s Krystin Porcella, who led the second-ranked Patriots to an undefeated season capped by their second straight Interscholastic Athletic Association of Maryland A Conference Tournament title.
She will be joined on the sidelines by Patterson Mill coach Jess Smith and recent UMBC graduate and standout Ali Levendusky. Porcella also will be coaching three of her former players: attacker Casey Ancarrow (going to James Madison) and midfielders Grace Gaeng (Maryland) and Allyson Carey (Vanderbilt).
“Some payers like Caroline Cochran from St. Mary?s, who is a rival, now I get to work with her and get to know her,” Porcella said. “It?s neat as a coach to battle someone for years and get to finally work with them.”
