Edward Kensik, Correspondent
SADDLE BROOK – The Saddle Brook girls lacrosse program hopes that Emily DiGiovanni will be a trailblazer.
DiGiovanni is the first Saddle Brook High School girls lacrosse player who will see playing time in college as she heads west to East Stroudsburg University in Pennsylvania.
And nobody is prouder of her accomplishment then her mother, Sharon DiGiovanni, who was her coach at Saddle Brook.
“I believe it’s big for any school that has a player who is recruited by a college,” said Sharon. “For us being such a young program, Emily’s recruitment will hopefully inspire other girls to come out for the team and help the program progress.”
Saddle Brook girls lacrosse has only been a varsity program for two years, but showed real progress this past spring after an 8-9 record while finishing second in the American Central B-7 league.
For the 2017 spring, Emily played mainly on defense and her season ended prematurely as she tore her right ACL in May. The thoughts of playing college lacrosse going up in smoke came to her mind. Despite being slated as a defender and missing playing time because of the injury, she tallied 20 goals, three assists and 24 ground balls while being named first-team all-league.
“No one wants their season cut short, so it was heartbreaking,” said Emily who tore her left ACL in 2015. “Right away, both times, my instant thought was: ‘I’m not going to be able to play college lacrosse anymore.’ But I worked and am working extremely hard to get back to 110 percent again to get ready for the college season. I just kept telling myself: ‘I can’t give up. I need to prove to people that I’m still capable of playing this sport at the next level.'”
For East Stroudsburg coach Xeni Barakos saw Emily play for a club team, Stick2Stick, last summer. And after getting to know her, Barakos thought DiGiovanni would be an asset for East Stroudsburg.
“What I liked about Emily is her work ethic when you talk to her and see her play,” said Barakos, who especially likes the intangibles and added DiGiovanni will see time on defense as a freshman. “We graduated a few seniors so we are looking for her to pick up some of the leadership.”
And Barakos said that she is not worried about the injury suffered last spring.
“Emily has done (rehab) before and she is ahead of schedule in her progress this time,” said Barakos.
DiGiovanni said that she chose East Stroudsburg over the likes of The College of New Jersey and Pennsylvania’s Millersville University and Bloomsburg University based on education and the quality of the lacrosse program.
“I felt that ESU was my place because one, they had an amazing nursing program that I couldn’t pass up and also, Coach Xeni made me feel extremely welcome and I don’t think I could find a coach like the anywhere else,” said Emily. “I was also following the team stats before I committed and they were having an awesome season. A team like ESU is a team I wanted to be a part of.”
Looking back at her years at Saddle Brook, Emily highlighted the game against Emerson/Park Ridge where she tore her ACL. She had a game-high five goals, but the Lady Falcons lost, 14-8, last May to Emerson/Park Ridge.
“The whole team went into that game ready to win,” said Emily. “I was ready to get that league title. I was playing the whole field that game, middle, defense, attack. The team just meshed so well that day. It was unfortunate that an injury ruined the strong vibe we were having but the team still ended the game strong and that’s all anyone can ask for.”
Her favorite game was last April in the Saddle Brook 20-14 home win over Passaic Valley.
“They were the favored team and we knew that but I don’t think anyone expected us to play the way we did that day,” said Emily. “We started that game off neck-and-neck. It was always tied. That’s how it was the whole game until about the last 15 minutes. That’s when we started dominating. Nothing was stopping us. We got all the faceoffs, we picked up all the ground balls, our passes and catches were on point. It was just an amazing game to watch.”
The Saddle Brook graduate and incoming East Stroudsburg freshman has played lacrosse since she was in fourth grade after trying other sports.
“I started with softball but I couldn’t really get into it and I was never really intrigued with running track and lacrosse was the only other sport running in the spring season so I gave it a shot and I fell in love,” said DiGiovanni. “The game is just so different than most sports. There is always so much going on, a little contact here and there. It’s just not like any other sport I’ve played before.”
Now she gets to play the sport she loves on the next level starting in spring 2018.
