Pennington School girls soccer coach Bill Hawkey has produced countless great players in his long career. Many played Division I, some played professionally and/or with the U.S. National Team.
It’s a star-studded group for sure.
Naturally, it had to be asked where Hamilton Square resident Morgan Kotch sat on that list.
Top five?
“Absolutely, and probably higher,” the Hawk said.
Wow.
As if it needed to be added after that comment, Hawkey said “She’s a special player.”
When that was relayed to Kotch, she responded: “Coming from Hawk, he’s seen some very good players, so that means a lot to me.”
Much like Kotch meant a lot to the Red Hawks over the past four years. In just three full seasons she became Pennington’s all-time goal scorer for both boys and girls with 108, helping the program to two NJISAA titles and three Mercer County Tournament championships.
But it was in Kotch’s freshman year — when Pennington played just four games due to Covid — that the striker showed she would be special. In the season’s second match against Hunterdon Central, Morgan went up against current Rutgers defender Emily Mason, the 2020 National Gatorade Player of the Year and two-time Gatorade New Jersey POY.
In a 2-0 win, the freshman beat the senior for a goal. A legendary career was officially underway.
“Morgan just impressed the hell out of us in that game,” said Hawkey, who co-coaches Pennington with Pat Murphy. “She had the job as our striker, she took on the assignment and she scored on that girl. Here’s an upstart freshman taking on arguably the best defender in the state, and Morgan as a wee freshman working her magic. We knew we had a talent at the time. We couldn’t wait to get her back the following year to unleash her.”
Over the next three seasons Kotch had 28 goals and nine assists; 40 and five, and 37 and seven. This past season, her 99th goal surpassed Kylee Rossi for the girls school record, and her 105th broke Jae Heo’s boys’ record.
“At the moment I scored the goal for the all-time record it didn’t sink in because you’re still in the game,” Kotch said. “Once I got subbed off and it hit me, it was a crazy feeling. It didn’t even feel real at the moment.”
And while that was a momentous moment, it all traced back to that goal against Mason.
“That was definitely my first test and that really started my whole career,” Kotch said. “That was one of the first very intense games I played in and I proved I should be up there. We knew she was very good and I ended up doing well. Everyone kind of shared in the goal scoring that year, but that one goal gave me the confidence once all those other girls left.”
It certainly quelled her fears about playing for a perennial state power.
“Freshman year, I came in and I was scared because they had a very good reputation,” Kotch said. “At that point I just wanted playing time. Once I got playing time, I was a starter and it went from there.”
And oh, how it went.
Kotch not only scored goals, she scored massively important goals. In the 2021 MCT, she tallied seven of the Red Hawks 11 goals, including the only ones of the game in 1-0 wins in the semifinals and finals.
As a junior she had a hat trick in a 4-0 MCT semifinal win over Robbinsville, and scored five of Pennington’s nine goals in the NJISAA Prep A semifinals and finals.
This past season, she amassed seven MCT goals, including a hat trick in a 4-1 win over Allentown in the finals. Then came the Prep Tournament final against Rutgers prep in a battle of nationally ranked teams. The two had never met in Kotch’s previous years but this year Prep A and Prep B merged into one tournament. With Pennington sputtering and trailing 1-0, Kotch got the goal to tie it and assisted on the game-winner in a 2-1 victory.
“I think after we scored that first goal, we thought ‘We can do this, we are just as good as them if not better,’” Kotch said. “It was definitely the game we were looking forward to all year. It was going to be (the seniors’) last Pennington game, we didn’t want to end on a losing note.
“It was intense. We were confident going in, once they scored we got a little bit timid and we gained our confidence back and finished strong. It couldn’t have been a better ending.”
The result put Pennington at 20-0 and ranked No. 7 in the United Soccer Coaches High School rankings. In Kotch’s four seasons at the school, the Red Hawks went 54-3-3 and won every championship that they could possibly win but one.
As for her 108 goals, it boggles the mind to think what that number could be if she had a full freshman season, or if she actually played in the second half of so many blowout wins. But Kotch wasn’t about padding stats with unnecessary goals. Only when it mattered.
“When the game’s on the line, she wants the ball,” Hawkey said. “One of her best friends is Hailey Adamsky. If she can find Hailey wide open, she’ll give it to her. When the game is kind of in hand, she’s looking for her teammates, trying to set them up and get them into the scoring column. Every great scorer has a little bit of selfish drive, they have to. But she’s as unselfish as it gets when it comes to her teammates.”
What makes Kotch a great scorer? First off, she’s nearly unstoppable in one-v-one situations. She’s also dangerous on set pieces, and can be dangerous when getting passes with her back to the goal. Hawkey claimed she has the hardest shot he’s ever seen.
And of course, there is that hunger to score.
“She’s a relentless attacker,” Hawkey said. “She has that mindset that she can’t be stopped. It’s an intangible. It’s hard to quantify that. It’s a certain quality about certain individuals. You want them to have the ball at the end of the game when the game’s on the line.”
It has been that way since Kotch started her career with the Hamilton Wildcats. She moved to a Howell travel team and currently plays for Real Jersey Football Club in Medford.
Aside from school and club training, Morgan works out with family members. Her brother Dylan is a former Steinert standout who saw playing time with MAAC champion Rider this year. Twin sister Mackenzie came off the bench for Pennington.
“It’s been good having Mackenzie,” Kotch said. “She’s been one of my biggest supporters, and I think that really helps my confidence.
“In the summer, me, her and my brother would play together. He’s very good. Way better than me. It’s definitely challenging playing against each other, and he never takes it easy on me.”
They made her good enough to earn a scholarship to Villanova, which offers everything Kotch was looking for.
“It took me a while to decide,” she said. “I had to figure out what I wanted and where I wanted to be. At Villanova, with the team, the coaches, I felt so welcome. It just came down to where I could picture myself.”
Hawkey likes the decision, saying, “We’re thrilled she’ll be in the local area. There was a lot of interest in her. Villanova has a great reputation. We’re psyched for Morgan, we think it’s gonna be a great fit for her and she’ll continue to do great things.”
Most importantly for Kotch, is that along with majoring in business, she will continue to play soccer. “When people say it’s more than a game, it’s not just a saying. It really is,” she said. “You build friendships and you learn so much. For me, the moment you step on the field nothing else really matters in that moment. I don’t know if you can say that about anything else.”
That mindset helped her to become the gold standard for goal scorers at Pennington.
“Pennington soccer is very well known. We’ve had so many good players coming through the program. To think it is me (who holds the record) is just unreal,” she said.
In Hawkey’s eyes, the achievement is very real.
“She’s a terrific kid, terrific person with a heart of gold; smart, funny. She’s the whole package,” he said. “And of course she’s an incredible competitor on the soccer field. She’s a great athlete overall. I just love her to death.”
Just as Kotch loved her four years at Pennington.
“Each year the team really bonded,” she said. “There was never a bad day. I think that I left my mark on soccer and I hope girls can keep the legacy going.”
It is a legacy in which Morgan Kotch now looms very large.
The Pennington School’s girls’ soccer team celebrate 100 career goals for Hamilton’s Morgan Kotch (holding sign) on Oct. 19, 2023. Story, page 26. (Photo by Jim Inverso.),
