Iowa City, IA - September 15, 2024: Pennsylvania is well known for its field hockey, whether it’s on the high school, club, college, or national level. At the 2024 Paris Olympics, the USA Field Hockey team had six players from Pennsylvania: Emma & Brooke Deberdine from Millersville, Sophia "Phia" Gladieux from Oley, Ashley Hoffman from Mohnton, Karlie Kisha from Hamburg, and Kelee LePage from Honey Brook.
In looking at many of the top college programs around the country, it's hard to find a team that does not have a student-athlete on its roster from the Keystone State. In the Lehigh Valley itself, you can see both the numbers and excitement with the sport at the youth and high school levels, the rosters are big.
On Friday, Keystone Sports Extra (KSE) covered the Penn State v Kent State field hockey match and noted in an article how both teams combined for a total of 24 student-athletes from Pennsylvania high schools. Just like college coaches know the depth of talent in Pennsylvania for wrestling, they know the same depth as far as field hockey.
Today, KSE continued its "on the road" series and covered the Iowa v Delaware field hockey match in Iowa City. Once again, there wasn't a shortage of players hailing from Pennsylvania on either team. In fact, Iowa had seven student-athletes while Delaware had four student-athletes.
In the fall of 2023, at the Pennsylvania Interscholastic Athletic Association (PIAA) championships, Emmaus High School (District XI/Lehigh Valley & Poconos) defeated Manheim Township, another powerhouse, 1-0 to win the 3A title. It was Emmaus’ third state title in four years. They have also won the District XI title for thirty-five years in a row.
In Iowa City on Sunday afternoon, almost 1000 miles from the Lehigh Valley, the 6th ranked University of Iowa field hockey team defeated the University of Delaware 1-0, behind, you guessed it, a former Emmaus High School player, senior Annika Herbine.
In the 2nd period, Annika took a pass from teammate Lieve Van Kessel around the twenty-five and from the top of the circle, she carried left and then pulled right around the goalkeeper to sink the game winner. Iowa improved to 4-1 overall with the win Sunday and sure to compete well into the Big10 and NCAA Championships.
Also on the Hawkeye team is Annika’s sister, Rachel, a sophomore, who played twenty-nine minutes Sunday, as well as Jacey Wittel, a senior from Pocono Mountain East High School; Alex Wesneski, a 5th-year senior from powerhouse (wrestling and field hockey) Wyoming Seminary (Forty-Fort); and Mia Magnotta, a junior, also from Wyoming Seminary. And that’s not all, there’s Gia Whalen, a sophomore from Villa Maria Academy in Paoli, and Lauren DeRose, a sophomore from the Agnes Irwin School in Collegeville. The players saw a lot of action, between 30-60 minutes each, except for Magnotta who played all 60 minutes as the goalkeeper and who didn't allow anything past her on a sweltering hot day. It was Iowa’s fourth shutout of the season.
After the game, Iowa Head Coach Lisa Cellucci, in her 11th year as the head coach and 25th as part of the team or staff, said: “That’s a very good Delaware team.” “I’m sure they’ll win a lot of games and be the champions of the CAA.” She continued by saying she felt good about getting out of it and just actually getting the win. “We had a really good scout on them, and we felt the team did a really good job.” “We’re choosing to cause some stress in some situations we don’t really need to, so we addressed that, but that’s going to happen with our youth at times.” “I think the best thing about this weekend and today is that we’ve been tested a lot of different ways in our first five games and it has prepared us really well going into the Big Ten season.”
Keystone Sports Extra had the opportunity to chat briefly with the Herbine’s and Wittel after the game, as well as get a group photograph (below) of all the Pennsylvania players on the Iowa team, along with Coach Cellucci.
All three players are happy with how the season is going so far, they are looking to continually improve, and said they are taking it one game at a time and not getting ahead of what's at task.
Annika and Jacey, being seniors, commented that "time flies here” and “you have to enjoy every moment.” They truly love being a Hawkeye and have had the best four years with this team, they are all best friends. Jacey added that she hopes to stay in Iowa City in order to pursue dental school and possibly a grad assistant position if time permits. Rachel, a Human Physiology/Pre-Med major, added that even though she is early in her second year, she has experienced such great leadership on the team and it is something she is not only learning a lot from but has admired. She gave a lot of credit to the awesome coaching staff. All three were very happy to be in Iowa City playing the sport they love and enjoying every minute.
All three players echoed the fact that Pennsylvania is the “home” of field hockey. They mentioned how deep the tradition of field hockey runs at Iowa. They said the alumni, called the “99ers,” are very supportive and active with the program. One alum, Tiffany Cappellano, is the current head coach at Oley Valley (PA) High School. Cappellano, who was on hand Sunday for homecoming, played for Iowa from 1999-2002. In 2023, she was named the National High School Coach of The Year by USA Field Hockey after leading her alma mater (1995-1998) Oley Valley to a PIAA 1A championship. Cappellano has played or coached field hockey at all levels and has won many awards in the sport. She also coached Sophia "Phia" Gladieux, a phenomenal player at Penn State and USA team member.
Annika, Jacey, and Rachel spoke about campus life and what a great experience they have had on the Iowa City campus. Annika joked, no she was serious, about how Dunkin Donuts is a favorite spot of hers to hang out but that the entire “close-knit” team, as Rachel and Jacey chimed in, gathers and studies at either the Encounter Cafe or the Bread Garden, both which have great food as well. By the way, Annika is also a physiology/exercise science major.
Going into their Big Ten season schedule, all three players were excited and looking forward to what this team can accomplish in 2024. With that said, they wouldn’t get too far ahead of themselves and so when asked about their biggest “competition” in the Big Ten, KSE will only say that it seemed like the ladies were really looking forward to a trip to Evanston in about five days. Let’s Go Emmaus…I mean Hawkeyes!
The below photograph shows the seven Pennsylvania players on the University of Iowa field hockey team, along with Head Coach Cellucci. Keystone Sports Extra wants to note that when the players were asked to pose for the photograph, they all called their coach over to be in the photograph as well. That says volumes…she’s not only their coach, but one of them for sure. That made us remember a quote from the great women’s basketball coach, Pat Summit, who once said: “You win in life with people, sports is just a game.”
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