As the PHS girls field hockey team charges up the field during an intense final game, Head Coach Heather Serverson closely watches each member’s position on the field. This is Serverson’s sixteenth season coaching the team, and through her coaching career, she has guided them to the 2019 Mercer County Tournament and the 2019 Central Jersey Group semi nals.

Serverson’s long experience in field hockey first began in high school where she found her love for the sport. Her passion continued as she played throughout high school and during her studies at Temple University. In her prior coaching career, she was exposed to players with varying abilities ranging from young beginners to college level athletes. Her ability to adapt in a variety of team settings allows her to lead the PHS Tigers.

“You cannot apply the same thing that you do one year to the team you have next year; you have to base [your coaching] off of what they present and what they need,” Serverson said. “Adaptability and flexibility is probably the number one thing that I bring to that leadership role.”

Stella Matsukawa ’22, a member of the PHS field hockey team, comments on Serverson’s leadership.

“She’s always thinking of new drills for us to practice that highlight many important aspects of the game,” Matsukawa said. “Her dedication to the sport makes us all want to work hard and have fun.”

As a teacher and a coach, Serverson’s coaching philosophy is to keep her team happy and to take failure as an opportunity to improve.

She stresses the importance of players not being discouraged by mistakes, especially in a competitive environment.

“Everyone looks at failure as a bad thing when, really, failure is just an attempt at something that didn’t work out,” Serverson said. “As long as you learn from it, it’s a success.”

Developing a strong relationship between team members is an essential element in sports, and COVID-19 did not prevent the PHS  eld hockey players from doing so. In fact, Serverson suggested that the team has gotten closer with each other. The Tigers compensated for the time lost from having no season last year by regularly getting together outside of school.

Serverson enjoys helping a team with different backgrounds and levels to function as a unit and work with each other on the  eld. Filled with passion and encouragement, Serverson shared some advice for the athletes who are coming back to play this year.

“We all just need to have fun, relax, and realize that we’re going to be coming out of this strange COVID-19 experience pretty soon,” Serverson said. “We have some really good athletic teams here at Princeton High School, so have fun, because you only get this experience until your senior year.”

So far, under Serverson’s coaching, the girls varsity field hockey team has a 14-1 record. They won their division and made it to the semi-final round of the Mercer County Tournament semi-finals.