Lady Panther Lacrosse Camp Builds Program's Future

Bridgewater girls varsity lacrosse coach Kathie DeBonis started the Lady Panther lacrosse camp in 1997 when they first started the lacrosse program—and now in its 15th year, the camp is still going strong and building the future of lacrosse for girls in the district.

This year, the camp has around 50 girls ranging from grades two through 10 in attendance.

"We want them to develop solid fundamentals," DeBonis said. "We work on that daily with the kids. We do a lot of team building games and a lot of fun activities other than just lacrosse."

The camp works on skills that include scooping ground balls; offense and defense on scoring; one-on-one plays and maneuvers; passing and shooting the ball; and more. They also discuss and implement strategy in different game situations.

The camp is being run by many of DeBonis's current and former lacrosse players, in addition to herself and assistant coach Lydia Pinto.

Current lacrosse players contributing to the camp are seniors Erin Eckert and Kayla Sullivan.

DeBonis has many Bridgewater-Raritan High School alumni lacrosse players bringing their knowledge and expertise to the camp while giving back to the program.

Alyssa Dragon graduated in 2008 and is currently playing lacrosse for Old Dominion College. Carlee Dragon is a 2010 Bridgewater graduate attending Long Island University's C.W. Post campus.

And recent 2011 Bridgewater graduates Stephanie Umbach and Kelly Fenton are set to continue their lacrosse careers at Muhlenburg College and Fairfield University respectively.

Becoming involved with and thriving in a sport like lacrosse is about more than just the skills the girls need on the field.

"We also try to aspire for them to be the best that they can possibly be no matter what they're doing," DeBonis said. "We develop all the skills that they would need to be successful in lacrosse and hopefully a lot of that transfers over to real life."

According to DeBonis, it's important to get players started in lacrosse and the program at a young age.

"If we can get the passion and the development of them as younger kids, obviously their passion can grow as they get older and they'll become better players," she said. "Its great to see the younger players now. I have fourth and fifth graders who have been playing for three or four years, and their skill level is tremendous. They're the future of our program here at Bridgewater-Raritan High School."