Team Florida Girls Lacrosse (TFG) announces its teams for the 2009 Summer and Fall Lacrosse season. The teams are composed of 80 girls representing all regions of Florida and the top skill level. Included on the team are eight players who recently captured the Florida IA State Title at Naples Baron Collier High School, and ten 100-point performers on their varsity high school lacrosse programs. Dozens of all-American candidates and top state award winners fill the rosters of these talented teams.

“Entering our fourth year as a program, we feel that this season will bring unprecedented success,” commented TFG Executive Director Paul McCord. “The track record of the program’s performance over the past two years has brought a lot of pride to the state of Florida and challenged some of the top club programs in the world. Additionally, this group (2010’s) feature 3 and 4-year club members. For them this is a culmination of a great journey. Many will move on to DI, DII and DIII programs and all of them will play somewhere in college. That type of success was unheard of when they started with TFG at the U-15 Festival in 2006.”

Featured in the class of 2010 are a dozen players completing their 4th year with the club. Their close bonds and development of skills over time is the hallmark of the LaxManiax. Over the last three seasons the program has seen sixty alumni move along to NCAA programs and more than 20 to WDIA programs, including SWLL champion Florida and runner up Central Florida. NCAA programs Rollins and Jacksonville University also have very strong LaxManiax presence with more than a dozen players split between the two universities and three alumni coaches.

“This year our focus and identity will be on Lax-Smarts. Frankly, we feel the state of Florida needs trickier players and not trickier plays! Our players have impressed college coaches with their skills, particularly our alums who are playing nationwide. But in order for us to take the next step, Florida players will need to learn the game and become true masters of the sport and not simply possess stick skills. The combination of athleticism, skills and smarts is what makes a great lacrosse player. They are all equally important to long-term success.”

Coaching this year’s club program are two former Division I standouts who also have honed coaching skills while coaching rival summer clubs. Sarah Gallion, the clubs acting director, will coach the 2011 TFG program. Gallion was a 3rd team all-American and Captain of Johns Hopkins University’s top-10 ranked program. Not only does Gallion have a unique and illustrious pedigree, she also has served as a coach to some of the top prep players through the NEMS (North East Maryland Select) club program. NEMS is widely considered one of the top clubs in the country and last year sent more than a dozen players to division I programs. Gallion also grew up playing for NEMS and earned a scholarship to JHU after a great summer season with the club. Gallion also coached a program for middle school and youth players while at Johns Hopkins called the “Little Jays”. She teamed with current Cincinnati Bear Cat head coach Lellie Swords, and IWLCA board member.

Heading up to 2011-12 TFG team will be former Hofstra standout Heather Albro. Albro finished her senior season at Hofstra third in goals, points, and draw controls from her midfield position in leading the Pride to an 11-7 record. She went on to lead Loudon Valley high school to a Virginia Prep runner up and coach for Upper Corner Elite, a club travel program in northern Virginia. This past season she led Ponte Vedra High School, a first year lacrosse program in North Florida, to a 15-2 record, falling to just one opponent on the season. PVHS did not have any seniors in their first year as a program. Albro’s coaching techniques and excellent example as a skilled player herself allow her to be a top coach in the state of Florida.

Coaching the 2010 TFG teams will be Paul McCord, Mary Hopkins (West Orange High School) and Chris Claussen (Baron Collier High School). McCord, who played and coached at Western Maryland College, has three years of college coaching experience and several seasons coaching several area high school programs. He has coached lacrosse, football, and track and field on the NCAA level, developing all-Americans in all sports. In addition, McCord has been an assistant coach with both the Baltimore Ravens and Jacksonville Jaguars in the National Football League. McCord is a standout defensemen for the Jacksonville Predators men’s club and serves as a consultant to several college programs.

Hopkins’ programs at West Orange and Lake Mary high schools have earned reputations as being top competitors every year, her players earning distinct honors and moving on to college programs. Presently, Coach Hopkins has two Orange alums competing at the Division I level and one at the Division II level. Hopkins has developed youth lacrosse at every turn and is a Vice-President of US Lacrosse Orlando and serves on the US Lacrosse Executive Board of Directors.

Not to be out done, Chris Claussen has coached Baron Collier to consecutive US Lacrosse State Championships in 2008 and 2009. BC earned runner up in 2007. His two year winning percentage is tops in Florida over that time and he has produced several NCAA players, including JU’s Abbie Warnken and Rollins’ Alyssa Emmens. Chris played NCAA lacrosse for Rochester and was a standout player on the men’s club league for many years.

Assisting TFG this year as college intern coaches will be Mel Hicks (DI - Detroit –Mercy), Tara Brock (DI – Jacksonville University), Liz Connelly (DII – Rollins College), Jess Sundman (DII – Pfeiffer University), and Cait O’Rourke (DII – University of Charlotte), and the 2009 NCAA collegiate consultant to the club will be Lauren Schwarzmann (JHU '08) from the University of Cincinnati. Mindy McCord, Jacksonville University, and her assistant Brooke Magnuson (Maryland ‘06) will serve as curriculum advisors.

“We could not be more happy the way all of this has come together. The girls competing for TFG and the LaxManiax Elite teams are going to have access to so many different, but excellent coaches and college players. I’m excited for our girls, our coaches and our state and look forward to coaching the class of 2010 and helping them to new heights,” added McCord.

TFG Starts their Summer Schedule at the South’s largest recruiting tournament, the Southern Alliance Tournament in Peachtree City, Georgia on May 30th. They will compete in the nation’s top recruiting events, the Intercollegiate Women’s Lacrosse Association (IWLCA) tournaments held in Pennsylvania and Maryland in June. The summer season is concluded with the Heatwave Championships in Ponte Vedra Beach in July. For more information, please contact Matt Ragland, Communications Director, MCC Sports, Inc. at Matt.Ragland@mccsportsinc.com.

About the Club:

Florida Girls Laxers have more opportunities to enrich their games and gain exposure to higher levels of play than ever before. Thanks in part to the more than 350 Elite tournament games played over the past three years and the more than 60 alumni now either in college programs or signed in the current graduating class of 2009, the TFG Program and LaxManiax Elite Club have something very special going on in the Sunshine State. Girls from all corners of the state and areas in between have had their lives changed by this amazing program!

TFG was born in 2006 when an upstart group of young ladies played their hearts out to the joy of Florida at the US Lacrosse U-15 Festival. While official scores were not kept, the 4-goal rule was applied to all but two of the 6 games played and the girls from Florida developed a reputation as being skilled, fast, and a whole lotta fun!