Premier of PPlc
Pittsburgh Premier Lacrosse Club (PPLC) had its first season in the summer of 2011. The club team was created so that girls from Pittsburgh would be able to play lacrosse at a competitive level and also learn from some of the best coaches in the area.
Katy Phillips, Katrina Silva, and Mike Scarborough founded the girl’s club team. All the coaches have or are coaching Division 1 girl’s lacrosse. Phillips is also one of the founding women of lacrosse in Pittsburgh, also ran the extremely popular 3 Rivers Lacrosse indoor league. "The coach sets the mood for the team and encourages and assists the players in improving," said Georgia Kourakas. Pittsburgh Premier lacrosse club has teams for graduating years of 2014, 2015, and a team for middle school, 2016-2018. In their first season, the teams traveled to three tournaments and were successful at all of them. The program provided opportunities to play against more competitive lacrosse teams outside of western Pennsylvania. However the program requires a lot of time so not all people are on a club team. Devon Recktenwald said, "It's a sport were you have to work really hard so at times I might not want to commit to all the preparation." While there are other competitive club lacrosse teams in Pittsburgh, this one focuses greatly on the recruiting process for the older girls looking to play in college. The coaches have many connections throughout the country, and being recruiters themselves, know how to get the players noticed. "I like watching college level games because they are so talented and the game is so fast," said Maddie Lieb. The play at college level is much faster than what the girls played in high school, so the coaches at PPLC are trying to prepare them for that. PPLC's team colors are lime green and navy blue. These colors transferred over to the 3 Rivers Lacrosse Program as well. Players received a jersey and shorts which they wore to practices and tournaments. After each season of play, players received a green stripe on the shaft of their stick, with navy blue around it. It gave a sense of unity to the girls who are all from different schools around Pittsburgh. The girls have become teammates and all look forward to the seasons to come. "You will be with them a lot and you need to be able to communicate during and after games," said Kayla Goedert on the importance of teammates working together. |