Ladue's Elena Gresick: Patch's Female Athlete of the Season

Elena Gresick, age 17 (birthday in July) from Ladue Horton Watkins High School is the Ladue-Frontenac Patch Athlete of the season. She richly deserves this honor for outstanding achievement in the two stick sports, lacrosse and field hockey.

What makes the story even more genuine is revealed by looking into her childhood.

Her name was Yelena and shipped off to an orphanage in St. Petersburg, Russia upon birth.

Her parents, Dr. Robert and Catherine Gresick of Frontenac rescued her from that orphanage, adopting both she and her older brother Joseph (student at Central Missouri University, studying criminal justice) and bringing them both to the United States. She has an older sister Alex, 23, a communications major at Maryville University who is the only natural born child of the three siblings. “I am very thankful for my parents to do that for me,” she said. She was age 1 at the time of adoption.

Gresick suffered severely from Rickets, a childhood illness caused by a serious lack of vitamin D. Her bones were weak, and her growth was shockingly slow. How she became such a talented athlete took some serious nurturing.

By the second grade she was playing field hockey, and by the third grade she fell for lacrosse.

Last fall she scored 8 goals, 16 assists for 24 points on the 18-7 field hockey team.

This season, she scored 108 goals and 34 assists for the Lady Rams lacrosse team, good for 142 points, the highest total in the region. The team had an 20-4 record and 4th place in the state. In a loss on senior day at MICDS, she went on a late-game scoring binge, recording 5 goals in the space of about 2 minutes.“I was pretty frusutrated about how things were going (with MICDS), and just decided to do something about it.”

Her coach Neil Theriault called her the best player Ladue has ever had in its program. Her field hockey coach Barb Dwyer said “she was a pleasure to coach.”

She’s taking her lofty talents to Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD to play Division III field hockey with hopes of wallking on the highly-regarded and nationally recognized lacrosse team.

She will study pre-medicine at JHU. She’s already made up her mind “I want to be a pediatric oncologist.” Her father is a radiologist at both DePaul and St. Clare Hospitals and her mother, former nurse is a stay-at-home mom now.

Gresick took a full load of advanced placement courses, and maintained a 3.9 GPA at Ladue. Her junior year, she became a member of the National Honor Society.

Volunteering is in her blood. The family does a lot a work for the “Small World International Adoption,” the organization that arranged her adoption. During Lent, she is often helping out busing and clearing plates at her parish fish fries at Our Lady of Pillar in Creve Coeur.

She’s never had time to hold down a student job.

Gresick has moved around the local school systems. She started at the Ladue Early Childhood Center then entered Conway Elementary. Her soccer friends went to Oak Hill School at Villa Duchesne so she talked her parents into letting her transfer. “They were reluctant at first to do that.”

After finishing 8th grade at Villa’s middle school, she transferred back into Ladue.

College won’t be easy. She’s loading up with a full slate of biology and neuroscience courses.

This summer, she will be involved in a national field hockey youth development program in Virginia Beach, VA. That’s where Olympic talent is fostered. Playing for the U.S. in the Olympics is not her ultimate goal. “I wouldn’t bypass medical school for a chance to play in the Olympics,” she reasoned.

Star lacrosse-field hockey player, Elena Gresick richly deserves the Player of the Season honors. She’s earned everything she’s gotten so far.