North Shore Field Hockey Cooking Up Something Good in 2011

A good sports team is often comparable to a solid food recipe: mixing different ingredients together to form the right kind of combination.

When Field Hockey coach Sarah Mills looks at her roster, she sees the building blocks of something Bobby Flay would be proud of if he were a sports fan. North Shore is 4-0 this season coming into a big matchup against New Trier at home on September 7.

“We not only have a really good senior class, but we return a good number of underclassmen who were on varsity,” Mills said. “We have also had the addition of a couple of really good freshmen.”

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It starts with North Shore’s main ingredients: the senior class. Co-captain Rachel Mabie anchors the defense and has been a starter since her sophomore year while co-captain Kim Kahnweiler controls the play in the middle of the field from her center midfielder position.

“She’s a phenomenal defender and great at initiating the attack,” Mills said of Kahnweiler. “She’s a great distributor and that’s not an easy role to take on.”

Senior Grace Flickinger, who Mills says is as gritty and gutsy as they come, leads the offense with seven goals in the young season.

Then there’s the sauce, the marinade and the add-ons: the experienced underclassmen and some varsity newcomers. Mills happily talked about all the offensive weapons this team has and a lot of it comes from sophomore Heather Mabie and junior forward Lizzy Gendell. Mabie had a hat trick in North Shore’s 6-1 victory over Woodlands Academy and Gendell has contributed a goal and two assists.

“We certainly did have some key losses [from last year’s team], but because of the depth of the players coming in, we’ve been able to fill those,” Mills said.

Lastly, there’s the spice, the flavor: the young, but talented freshmen.

Mackenzie Nolan is starting in her first year and had an assist in her first varsity game against Deerfield.

While all the ingredients are laid out for a successful season, Mills knows that the cooking process is what really defines how the year will be remembered. Even after a 4-0 start, Mills says there are still things this team needs to work on. Communication and transition defense were the two biggest things in her eyes.

And like any good food, it will take time.

“We haven’t yet gotten to the place where we we’ve completely gelled, but we’re going at a pretty good pace and we’re getting there,” Mills said. “There’s really good things ahead this season.”

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