ALL-AREA: OJR’s Morgan joins rare company as two-time Player of Year

By Austin Hertzog
ahertzog@pottsmerc.com


BUCKTOWN — Being the best player on one of the four best teams in all of Pennsylvania wasn’t enough.
Emily Morgan still had a senior season to play, and she was determined to be even better.
How much more could she give after being the motor in the center of midfield for an Owen J. Roberts team that made an emotionally-charged run to the PIAA semifinals, rallying around one another in the wake of teammate Kelsey Kramer’s untimely death?
The ‘D’ in Morgan’s DNA stands for defense, her ability to tackle, dispossess an opposing player, and positional intelligence second to no one in the area for quite some time. So in her final scholastic season Morgan decided she needed to go on the attack.
“I said to my mom at the start of the year, ‘I want to score goals.’ Last year I had around seven goals and, not that a midfielder is supposed to be the leading goalscorer or be the biggest presence in attacking, but at the same time you (need to be influential).
“My main focus was working on my attacking game. I feel like I can always do better, but I did better than last year.”
Morgan brought her usual defensive excellence as a senior and contributed 11 goals and eight assists — reaching double-digit goals like she hoped — to a Wildcat team that finished 17-4-2 this season.
“That was a luxury — every time we stepped on the field we knew we had the best player on the field,” OJR coach Joe Margusity said. “Everything flowed through her during the game.”
The abundant team success of her junior season couldn’t be matched in her senior season, but Morgan brought what she does best and more to solidify her place as one of the finest players to come through the highly-successful Owen J. Roberts program.
Morgan’s spot as one of the area’s best is now solidified on the short list of players to be named The Mercury All-Area Girls Soccer Player of the Year twice. She joins past OJR standouts Laura Kane (1998, 2000) and Jen Michewicz (1999, 2001) as a rare two-time recipient.

(For complete story, click here ...)