Natalia Ogando and her Non-Traditional Route to Felician Lacrosse
Junior student-athlete Natalia Ogando is a junior lacrosse player at Felician University in Rutherford, New Jersey. Her journey from Queretaro, Mexico to the roster of Felician’s lacrosse team is anything but ordinary.
Ogando grew up playing soccer in Mexico and had dreams of playing professionally her entire childhood. Her parents were always supporting her, even helping her make videos for college coaches who could watch her play. Because of their collective efforts Ogando decided to attend Felician University in New Jersey on a soccer scholarship after she graduated high school in 2022.
“My family has always been a very important part of this, because they support every decision that I make. They helped me with interviews, and getting video to coaches in America so they could see me and want me in their school. That’s why I came to Felician.”
Hailing from Mexico, coming to the United States was a big enough adjustment in and of itself. However, after falling in love with a new sport in the spring of her freshman year, she was willing to make another big adjustment.
One night she and her friends decided to go to a lacrosse game. Ogando had gotten to be friends with some of the players on the lacrosse team so she thought she might as well go support her friends any way that she could. It was her first time watching a lacrosse game and she quickly had an interest in the sport.
That same spring she began experimenting with lacrosse and started doing some of the drills her friends were doing with them and on her own. That summer she went back home to Mexico to play a mix of soccer and lacrosse. She played on a recreational soccer team in Mexico, but she didn’t have anyone to practice lacrosse with.
“The only thing I could do for lacrosse was do drills in my house,” Ogando said. “All I could do was wall ball and just go run while cradling getting comfortable with the stick.”
Though it took many reps to get it down, over time she was able to hone her skills to a point that she felt she could earn a lacrosse scholarship at the University.
“Cradling was tough at first,” Ogando said. “My hands could not imitate the movement until I just kept doing it every day.”
By fall, she decided to pursue lacrosse and leave soccer in the rear-view mirror.
Remarkably, she was able to transfer her scholarship from soccer to lacrosse at Felician after showing the lacrosse coaches the improvements she made over the summer. The dividends of her switch paid off immediately when she scored her first goal in her first ever lacrosse game.
“At first, my dad had doubts about it,” she said about making the decision with her parents. “But then I talked him through it and they supported me and they were happy because it was the happiest I’ve ever been since I got to college.”
Her parents continue to support her and watch every game from home. Natalia’s mother and sister even flew up to New Jersey from Mexico to take in one of her games in person.
Ogando continues to thrive as a member of the lacrosse team at Felician, and as she heads into her junior season, she is determined to be a leader on the team by setting an example for the incoming freshmen. She also wants to encourage the freshmen to join her in her work ethic by inviting them out to extra practice or even hanging out with them if they may feel homesick.
Now that she has established herself at Felician, Ogando’s dream right now is to qualify for the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles. Her father is from Spain, so she is eligible to play for either the Mexican or Spanish lacrosse teams.
Ogando has been in contact with coaches for both national teams, and like any goal she’s ever had she’s working at it with all her heart to make that dream a reality.
