Grantham, PA — On the heels of arguably the most successful season in the history of Messiah field hockey, the program was steeply honored Tuesday, as the National Field Hockey Coaches Association announced junior Julie Barton as the 2009 NFHCA Division III National Player of the Year.
Barton becomes the third player in program history to claim the nation’s top individual honor, joining 2005 grad Aftan Fisher and 2004 grad Danae Chambers — each of whom claimed the award in their respective senior season.
In addition to the national player of the year award, Barton was selected a 2009 Longstreth/ NFHCA First Team All-American, her second consecutive honor. Junior Kourtney Ehly joined Barton with First Team All-American accolades, while senior Ashely Mowery was named a 2009 Longstreth/NFHCA Second Team All-American, her second consecutive honor.
Senior Katie Love rounded off Messiah’s All-Americans, acquiring Third Team status.
“I’m very excited for Julie, and also for Ashley, Kourtney and Katie,” said Jan Trapp, Messiah head coach. “We will miss Ashley and Katie dearly, but we’re certainly excited to have Julie and Kourtney back again. These awards speak very highly of not only their play on the field, but to their work ethic and commitment to the sport overall.”
Perhaps no one worked harder — or more selflessly — than Barton, as the center midfielder guided Messiah to its 13th ‘Final Four’ appearance and seventh national championship game, dishing out a team-high 12 assists from her center midfield position. The Hummelstown, Pa. native also scored eight goals on the year, including a pair of game winners — both of which came in sudden-death overtime.
Barton helped the Falcons past conference rival Lebanon Valley College Nov. 15 in NCAA Third Round play, scoring a golden goal just 5:31 into the first overtime to punch Messiah’s ticket into this past weekend’s national semi-finals.
Barton also carded an overtime game winner against Salisbury University back on Sept. 19, negating the Sea Gulls’ game-tying goal at the last moment of regulation — helping Messiah to another 3-2, OT decision.
“Julie is an outstanding player, and she’s the ultimate competitor,” Trapp said. “She could have scored more goals on the season, but she’s extremely unselfish. She would rather pass up a good shot to get her teammates a great shot. She sees the field extremely well, and seems to always come up with the ball when she’s around it. You’ll see her back on defense and in our attack, she does it all. Some players know what needs to be done some of the time. Julie knows what needs to be done all the time.”
Barton was also named the 2009 NFHCA Division III South Atlantic Region Player of the Year as well as earning national player of the year honors from the privately operated womensfieldhockey.com. She was also voted Commonwealth Conference Player of the Year this season, while league coaches named her a First Team All-Commonwealth selection for the second straight year.
Ehly, meanwhile, became Messiah’s 22nd individual to claim First Team All-American honors in program history, earning the same award from womensfieldhockey.com as well. Ehly scored a team-leading 29 goals on the season, averaging 1.26 per — the fourth-best average in the country at the NCAA Division III level.
Love wasn’t far behind with 24 goals on the year — a 1.04 goals-per-game-clip — the 18th-best average in all of NCAA Division III.
Both Ehly and Love dished out 11 assists from their forward position, combining to play a part in over half the team’s offense on the year.
Mowery, meanwhile, finished seventh in the nation in goals-against-average (0.80) and tied for 18th in the country in save percentage (82.3 percent), concluding the year with 93 saves to just 20 goals allowed. Like Ehly, Mowery earned a mirroring All-American honor from womensfieldhockey.com.
Regionally, all four of Messiah’s award winners earned Longstreth/NFHCA Division III South Atlantic Region First Team honors.
Collectively, Messiah’s season was about as good as it could get, as the team compiled a perfect, 22-0 record heading into the NCAA Division III National Championship game — a contest which ended in a heartbreaking, 1-0 loss to Salisbury University.
It marked only the second time in program history that a Falcons’ team entered the national championship with an unbeaten record. The other came during the 1984 season, where Messiah dropped a 3-2 heartbreaker to Bloomsburg University in the title game.
Despite the bitter ending to an otherwise remarkabley year, the Falcons collected 12 of their 22 wins against teams ranked in the Kookaburra/NFHCA Top 20 Poll, playing arguably the toughest schedule in the country. Messiah claimed the number one ranking in the aforementioned poll for nine straight weeks, the longest consecutive streak in program history.
Head coach Jan Trapp also collected her 500th win during the season, becoming — at the time — only the third coach in the history of collegiate field hockey to do so.