Maryland leads Olympics-bound U.S. national field hockey team with four players

The Terps continue to produce international caliber field hockey players, one of several goals for coach Missy Meharg and her staff.

Kelee Lepage found out when she was roused from her sleep. Emma DeBerdine had already been awake for four hours.

Lepage, DeBerdine, older sister Brooke and Leah Crouse learned June 10 they would represent Maryland after being selected to the 16-player United States national team for this summer’s Olympic Games. And Terps assistant coach and goalkeeper coordinator Jenny Rizzo was named a provisional athlete and will travel with the squad to Paris.

Maryland has the most players on the American roster. Northwestern, North Carolina and Penn State have two players each.

The opportunity to compete for the United States on the world’s biggest athletic stage is one the players don’t take lightly.

“I feel like it’s such an honor and a privilege to be able to represent the United States,” said Lepage, a defender. “And for most of us on the team, it’s been a dream for such a long time. When I got the notification that I was on the team, I was just shaking. I felt like I was shaking for a while, and I was expecting myself to cry or do different things, but I think it was just like, ‘Wow.’ It’s real life, not just a dream anymore.”

Emma DeBerdine — a midfielder like her sister — was too amped up to sleep the night before the national team’s roster would be revealed. So she woke up at 4 a.m. at her parents’ home in Millersville, Pennsylvania, and tried to keep busy until the 8 a.m. announcement.

“I was just very nervous knowing what was going to come,” she said. “I think it was just nerves and a little bit of anxiety knowing that I had to wait. It felt like it was so far away, but it was just a few hours.”

Crouse, another defender, was also awake early because of jet leg after returning from London a few days before. When she got the good news, her father Brad opened the front door of the family home and shouted, “We’re going to Paris!” to their neighbors.

“So I’m not sure who was more excited about it — me or my father,” she quipped. “He was crying, and I was crying. It was a great moment.”

All four Terps players are well-versed in international play with 184 combined appearances for the national team. Crouse and Emma DeBerdine contributed to the United States earning a silver medal at the 2023 Pan American Games in Santiago, Chile, and all four spent at least one season in the International Hockey Federation Pro League.

But they recognized that participating in the Olympics has a different tinge.

“I feel like the Olympics has that name,” Lepage, 26, said. “It’s the Olympics, but what we’re going to do is to obviously play field hockey. So I feel like we’ve almost had a lot of preparation for it.”

All four enjoyed decorated careers at Maryland. Brooke DeBerdine became the first player in program history to start 100 games in her career from 2017 to 2021 and still owns the school record with 104 all-time starts.

Emma DeBerdine, who will use her final year of eligibility in College Park this fall, has started 75 of 76 career games and amassed 69 points on 23 goals and 23 assists. Lepage started 70 of 91 games from 2016 to 2019, totaling 43 points on 11 goals and 21 assists. And in 2022, her lone season with the Terps after transferring from Duke, Crouse compiled 25 points on 10 goals and five assists in 22 starts and led that team with five game-winning goals.

The foursome agreed that playing for longtime coach Missy Meharg and her staff helped shape their skills and provide the motivation to aim high. The Terps have won seven NCAA Tournament national championships — the last coming in 2011 — and finished as runner-up six times under Meharg, who took over in 1988.

“Maryland field hockey demands excellence, and each day and each practice, you have to show up and compete and do your best,” Crouse, 24, said. “There’s just this tradition of success you want to uphold. Being a part of that really teaches you to want to continue that.”

Five other Maryland players were named last month to the Under-21 national team that will compete in next month’s Junior Pan American Championship in British Columbia, Canada. They are forwards Maci Bradford and Ella Gaitan, midfielder Hope Rose, defender Josie Hollamon, and goalkeeper Alyssa Klebasko, an Odenton resident and Garrison Forest graduate.

Meharg credited her coaching staff and their love for the sport with developing world-caliber players.

“I want Maryland field hockey to be the place where young women can get a great degree, play great field hockey, and be in a position to be champions,” she said. “But I am just as responsible for providing an environment where they can play for their country and be a world champion and play in the Olympic Games. That’s always been a huge plus for me, especially in recruiting, and I really make that a huge part of that.”

The Maryland ties that bind the players run deep. But they emphasized that they are eager to blend their talents with their U.S. national teammates.

“That’s where we came from, but we’re one now as USA,” Lepage said. “I feel like we have such a strong culture and friendship amongst everybody that we have that connection regardless of where we went to school.”

Meharg pointed out that all four players come from athletic families. Mike DeBerdine played football at Franklin & Marshall, Brad Crouse ran track in College Park, and Joanie Lepage played field hockey at West Chester.

“These athletes can run, and their determination and commitment to the demands of that and stay fit is really exceptional,” she said. “And outside of that, they’re still getting better and better.”

The Americans missed the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo, and their best finish was a bronze medal at the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles. Reigning Olympic champion Netherlands has captured gold four times, Great Britain won the title in 2016 and Argentina has won two silver and two bronze medals in its past five appearances.

Emma DeBerdine, who celebrated her 23rd birthday earlier this month, is fully aware that analysts don’t give the United States much of a chance to medal in Paris.

“I think that kind of fuels our fire,” she said. “It’s something that we’re used to, and it’s something that we’re excited to prove everyone wrong.”