They don’t wear ballet slippers, they can’t stand on their tippy toes and they don’t compete in tutus. But Cora Butler and Kendall Franke sometimes perform with the beauty of premier dancers in the eyes of Robbinsville High girls’ lacrosse coach Jenna Colicchia.
“They work together on what I call the Ballerina Play,” Colicchia said. “They screen for each other and do this spin move to run a give-and-go pass, and it’s seamless every time. They just read each other. They’re so in sync with each other that I always say ‘You guys look like you’re dancing.’”
Both seniors jokingly roll their eyes at that analogy, but explain why their coach might feel that way. .
“A lot of times we look at each other and know what we want to do,” Butler said. “Even if we don’t have a set plan in place we can keep moving off each other until we find an opening. We can do a sniper pass, a quick shot and it will work a lot of the time.”
Their play is so smooth it almost looks rehearsed, hence the ballet insinuation. Their instincts to play off each other are uncanny and have provided impressive results.
Entering the Ravens April 3 regular-season opener with Notre Dame, Butler has 95 career goals and 34 assists, while Franke has 94 goals and 27 assists. They scored their 100th career point in the same game last year and are hoping to replicate that cool feat with their 100th goals on the same day.
“That would be fun,” Franke said.
It would not surprise either girl, as both entered high school confident they could be 100-goal scorers. It’s rare to have that kind of double-edged firepower on the same team and Colicchia is loving it.
“Usually we have one leading scorer and someone else is way down,” she said. “They’re great scorers but they’ve helped to create confidence in our underclassmen so we have multiple girls following in their footsteps. We have so many players able to catch and go. Kendall and Cora have helped to establish our culture. They’re making it a trickle-down effect.”
Other scoring threats are junior Morgan Gonser, who had 37 goals last year, and sophomore Emma Reeves (25). There appears to be enough firepower to improve on a 10-11 record in 2023 that included five losses by two goals or less.
“I’m so excited, we have so much talent on this team,” Butler said. “The biggest thing is being able to feel each other out. Like how me and Kendall have that ‘We know what each other is doing all the time,’ thing. There’s so many good players that have so many unique methods of going to goal and we can use it so well if we get in each other’s minds a bit.
“We’re on that track. We’re trying to connect with each other all over the field. Fast passes, efficient passes. Everyone looks aggressive and we’re splitting the work evenly. I think it looks good, we just have to put it together.”
When it comes to Butler and Franke, however, offense is only half the story. Both started at attack as freshmen, but Colicchia quickly saw their ability to defend and dropped them to midfield.
“They’re very even players,” the coach said. “They don’t foul on defense. They can read the game very well so having them on defense helps keep us organized. They’re great covering their cutters, they force a lot of turnovers. They just make a lot of big plays. When you have players who make those big plays you don’t want to keep them on just one half of the field.”
And as cohesive as she and Butler are offensively, Franke feels the entire outfit needs to be that way on defense.
“You really gotta be there for your teammates,” she said. “You gotta work hard for each other as well as just pushing yourself to be your best. Defense is something so different from offense because you have to move as a unit.
“Offense can become a very individual show but defense always has to be working together on the same page. You have to shift and move and cover the right girls. It’s an attitude and communication is really important.”
Franke and Butler have been communicating for RHS from the start. They were the lone freshmen on varsity with playing experience, which helped them bond.
Prior to that, Butler went to St. Gregory the Great in middle school while Franke attended Pond Road after moving from Arizona in third grade.
The two played together moderately in the Robbinsville Lacrosse Association but didn’t make a true connection. Butler dabbled in softball as a kid and,after enduring a year of physical therapy due to a knee issue, she tried lacrosse in sixth grade. After the COVID pandemic, she played travel in 8th grade.
“I just thought it was a lot of fun,” she said. “I picked it up easily. Once you get the skills down you can be aggressive. There’s so many different skills. I play soccer and basketball (for RHS) so you can incorporate all those skills with stick skills and I could use everything I already knew and put it into this sport and I fell in love with it.”
Franke got an earlier start in the sport. Upon arriving in New Jersey “my uncle got one of those little sticks you get from Costco that you play with in the backyard. I had so much fun, I made my parents sign me up.”
After playing in RLA—with Gosner’s father serving as the coach—she moved to travel in fifth grade and played for various club teams. Franke formerly dabbled in gymnastics and while she didn’t feel that helped with lacrosse skills, she noted that “when you’re little it does build body awareness and helps coordination.”
After a few years knowing of each other, the two got to truly know each other as starting freshmen attackers for the Ravens. From there, they helped bring out the raw talent in one another.
Butler had nine goals and seven assists in ninth grade, improved to 30-9 as a sophomore and 56-18 last season. Franke’s three-year ledger is 13-3, 39-8 and 42-16.
“As we got older and started being the more dominant players on the team as upperclassmen, we started to lead and our relationship started to build a lot more,” Butler said.
Colicchia noted that both players are quick with a strong shot. And while their personalities are different their playing style is similar.
“They’re very aggressive,” Colicchia said. “If they make a mistake they’re the first ones to hustle to get the ball back. They can be trusted to try and take the last shot and be able to handle the pressure. They put themselves on the line to help the team be successful.”
In assessing each other’s play, there is mutual respect.
“Kendall’s shot is insane,” Butler said. “It’s so fast. It leaves her stick so quickly. She has a great dodge, she likes to catch and shoot, we both like to BTB (go behind the back). We like to work together on the draw and use our aggression there too.”
As for Butler, Franke said, “Cora’s just a really tough player. There’s always a moment you’ll really see it in a game. She’ll have four people on her and she’ll always get through. She’ll push to get to where she needs to be and she really is very shifty, fast and has a lot of hustle plays. She’s just a tough player.”
Probably the biggest advantage they have is each other. It’s tough enough to mark one big scorer, but trying to defend two is nearly impossible.
“If one of us is having a really good game they’ll man mark us,” Franke said. “They’ll keep someone on us the whole time. But that doesn’t worry me. If Cora’s man marked I know she has me to help, and if I’m man marked I know she’ll help me out.”
The girls are equally impressive off the field. Butler has a weighted grade point average of 4.5, is president of the National Honor Society and is part of the Chinese Club with teammate Daphne Luong (who is a team captain along with Butler and Franke). She will not play lacrosse in college and is waiting to hear back from the Naval Academy in Annapolis.
Franke sports a 3.7 GPA and was a football cheerleader the past two autumns. She will also forgo lacrosse in college and is still deciding on where to go.”
One thing is certain – when they are gone, Colicchia will feel a twinge of sadness.
“The biggest thing about those two is I’m excited to show up at practice every day because of the energy they bring,” she said. “Obviously you can’t tell when they’re freshmen if they’re going to be able to lead the way you hope they can. But they both have it, and that makes me so excited to show up every day with them. I’m usually tough on them, but I’m really proud of the way they handle themselves as seniors.”
One might say they have pirouetted their way into their coach’s heart.
Robbinsville High School lacrosse players Kendall Franke (left) and Cora Butler. (Photo by Rich Fisher.),
