K

atie Hoeg grew up on the East End of Long Island playing softball and lacrosse in the spring. Eventually, the stick-and-ball bug bit so hard that she gave up the softball diamond for the lacrosse field.

Hoeg hasn’t looked back.

“I guess it was just one of those feelings,” Hoeg said on Monday from her home in Mattituck, where she returned after the top-ranked North Carolina women’s lacrosse team’s season ended March 13 in light of the NCAA’s decision to cancel spring sports due to the COVID-19 crisis. “It was something where, I kind of just felt freed when I played. It was a source of comfort and an outlet that let me showcase all my hard work.”

And although “hard work” is all too often a cliché in the sports world, Hoeg and those around her truly attribute her monumental rise up the Tar Heels’ record book to her unparalleled desire to improve.

Year over year, Hoeg hopes to get better. And the numbers exemplify that drive. The 5-foot-11 attacker notched 16 points in 19 games as a freshman, then 89 points as a sophomore and a UNC-record 73 assists (104 points) as a junior. Then, in just seven games this year, the senior accrued 52 points — which put her on pace for well more than 104 when factoring in a likely playoff run.

On March 10, Hoeg’s four goals and four assists boosted her career points total to 261, breaking Corey Donohoe’s school record of 256, set from 2008-11.

“No, not at all,” said Katie’s father, James Hoeg, when asked if he ever envisioned this for his eldest child. “We went in with eyes wide open, knowing that UNC gets a lot of great players every year. She went there just wanting to win a championship. That was her main goal. These records and everything else are icing on the cake.”

Donohoe was one of many to reach out to Hoeg after she broke the record in a 20-18 win over Northwestern in Evanston.

“She gave me an Instagram shoutout,” Hoeg said. “That was really surprising for me to see. She comes to alumni weekends, but I never really got the chance to talk to her and get to know her.

“It definitely reinforced the whole ‘we before me’ mentality. When I graduate and become [an alumna] like they are, I can’t wait to be supportive and watch everyone else be successful.”

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The Hoeg family essentially built the Mattituck/Southold girls’ lacrosse program from the ground up. The family grew the Tuckers from the youth level to a perennial New York State Class D power. The program captured its second state title in its nine-year history last spring.

“I knew the family from actually years ago, probably when her and [her cousin] Audrey were the same graduating year,” Mattituck/Southold coach Matt Maloney said. “When they were in fourth and fifth grade, I coached them in travel.”

Maloney coached for rival East Hampton High School for part of Hoeg’s career before taking over the Mattituck/Southold job for her junior and senior seasons. By the time he got there, Hoeg was an established force and clearly one of the best players in the state.

She was a varsity starter in seventh grade, and her advanced skill set — even at a young age — likely molded her into the player she is now.

“I know a lot of coaches just went with the faceguard, lock-off situation,” Maloney said. “With a young player, you had success defensively doing that because there wasn’t a great supporting cast around her yet. By the time I got there, she had been faceguarded so much that she had developed just the IQ to try to get open and use other players on her team.”

Hoeg never won a state championship with Mattituck — that credit goes to her younger sisters Riley, a freshman at Virginia, and Mackenzie, a senior at Mattituck on her way to Virginia, and her cousin Claudia, a freshman goalkeeper at William and Mary — but she helped lay the framework for sustained success.

Hoeg said her siblings, including her younger brother, James, helped mold her into who she is.

“They’re definitely the reason why I’m the competitive spirit I am today,” she said. “I have three younger siblings, and the four of us are within five years of each other. We would do every type of sport in our backyard. I have a brother who’s a year younger than me, and I just wanted to beat him, no matter what.”

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The word “different” often comes up in conversations about Hoeg.

“Her class was, I thought, a pretty talented class coming out,” UNC coach Jenny Levy said. “A lot of them went to different places across the country, but we felt really excited to get Katie. She was top on our list. She’s different.”

Still, those around Hoeg were concerned, to a degree, about her transition to college life. She had been a big fish in small pond. In 2010, the town of Mattituck had a population just north of 4,200. Mattituck High’s senior class, according to U.S. News & World Report, is 133.

“When she graduated high school, she was a six-time varsity starter, never came off the field,” Maloney said. “Exemplary student and athlete at Mattituck, valedictorian, everything. Going to UNC, they won the national championship her senior year of high school. In the back of my mind, I thought this kid might have some college growing pains stepping onto a national championship team and not being used to being on the bench.”

Hoeg might have experienced some growing pains, but she did a fine job of hiding them. She clearly took a backseat offensively in 2017, but who could blame her? Just take a peek at that roster, and you’ll understand why.

“I came to a team with some great attackers in Molly Hendrick and Sammy Jo Tracy and Ella Hazar,” Hoeg said. “I was used to being the best player on my team. I think freshman year was a huge eye-opener for me. Like, ‘You have a lot of work to do if you want to do what you did for your high school team.’

“I was inspired by them, but it humbled me. It was a culture shock. I needed that year to serve as motivation and to make sure I wasn’t satisfied.”

That’s why Hoeg hits the gym every day, even while unexpectedly forced home by the novel coronavirus outbreak. Her father said that sometimes she’s so focused on the next goal that she forgets to celebrate the victories, like setting the points record, for example.

“She’s always focused on what’s next,” he said. “She is a very driven kid, both on the field and in the classroom. That’s actually one thing we’ve had to temper with her. You have to enjoy the moment sometimes.”

And what’s next, for her and some other seniors around the country, is another shot at playing.

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Hoeg has every intent to come back to UNC for another year of lacrosse. Levy remembered the conversation she had with Hoeg and two other seniors when coaches heard the news that the NCAA would encourage all three divisions to provide “eligibility relief” to spring athletes.

“Katie’s not a highly emotional person, but she was extremely emotional during that time,” Levy said. “When we found out the NCAA was granting eligibility, we FaceTimed her and — shocker — she was on the way to the weight room with her teammates. We told her, and she was crying, sobbing.”

Hoeg’s initial plans were to take a gap year and then attend school to become a dentist like her father. Dental school is still in her future plans — hopefully at UNC, so she can “continue to be a Tar Heel,” she said — but she’s OK with letting that take a back seat for the time being.

“Part of how I got through a lot of the news was just the hope that I could play again,” she said. “I had a feeling my story wasn’t over. I put in too much time and too much energy, and I have too much love for the sport for it to end on that note.”

Like most athletes, Hoeg needs a sense of closure, her father said.

“You want to end your career on the field,” he said. “Win or lose, all these athletes can accept what happens on the field. She said she felt that her career can’t be done. She felt that somehow, some way, she was going to continue and finish her career on the field.”

She’s driven. She’s different. And she’s ready for more.

Said Hoeg: “I owe it to the girl who put in all that work and my family for supporting me through everything.”