Northwestern Lehigh High School graduate Courtney Page has played in all of Slippery Rock University’s field hockey games over the last three seasons (55 games). She has recorded eight goals and seven assists and is also a leader of the Rock program off the field as well. Slippery Rock has been her home away from home over the last three years.

“I would say that coming to Slippery Rock is one of the best decisions that I have made as a student and as an athlete because I feel that it was the best fit for me,” said Page. “Coming onto a team that had a very high standard for success on and off the field is something that has pushed me to be my best. Our team this past spring broke our own record and recorded a 3.95 team GPA and for the year recorded a 3.82 cumulative GPA.”

Growing up in Pennsylvania, the state schools all wanted Page to commit to them, but Slippery Rock stood out above the rest.

“I chose SRU because I felt like it was the best fit for me academically and athletically,” Page said. “When I was looking at colleges, I wanted a school with a lot of different majors because at the time I was undecided on what I wanted to do with my life. Besides academics, athletically I knew I wanted to go to a school that had competitive field hockey and the PSAC was just the right fit for me. I had looked at most other PSAC schools such as Shippensburg, Kutztown, East Stroudsburg, but Slippery Rock felt the most like home to me. The fact that both of my parents went to school here and my sister Taylor now plays here really does make it feel like home.”

With the PSAC canceling fall sports with the intent on moving them to the spring semester, Page and her Rock teammates have been keeping busy in preparation for what they hope is any type of competition.

“As a senior, I am looking forward to playing in the spring because of the amount of time my teammates and I have to prepare and to get to know our new head coach, Rayell Heistand,” said Page. “Some of my goals this season would be to be competitive in the playoffs and to shock the PSAC. I’m very excited to play this year because I think that we could have a few upsets go in our favor.

“As of right now, my teammates and I are doing individual practices and some small group sessions and we also have access to our weight room.”

Her success on the field and in the classroom all started at Northwestern Lehigh, where she learned a lot of life lessons to show her how to succeed in college.

“Going through college I am grateful and proud to have gone to Northwestern,” said Page. “I believe that it prepared me for college and has helped me achieve all of the academic accolades that I do have and I am very grateful for it. I still like to stay active in the community by watching their field hockey games as my younger sister Brooke is on the team.”

Page does it in the classroom too, earning PSAC Scholar-Athlete honors all three years thus far, majoring in Integrated Marketing.

“Balancing school and athletics isn’t always the easiest thing, but I found that being well organized and prepared has helped me stay on top of my academics,” Page said. “At the beginning of the year, I plan out when I will have my free time for school work around class and practice, and only having a few hours every day for academics pushes me to stay motivated and complete all of my work on time. During this fall, I have tried to maintain a similar schedule of what I am used to.”