By Joe Vernice
Port Washington native Jake Froccaro is a Schreiber alumnus and a current professional athlete in the Premier Lacrosse League or PLL, where he plays as a midfielder for the Chaos. Froccaro’s two uncles, Vinnie and Steven Sombratto, both professional players, introduced him to the game at a young age. Froccaro fell in love with lacrosse and has been playing ever since. Froccaro played for Schreiber High School, where he graduated in 2012, and later for both Princeton and Villanova, where he graduated in 2017. He then continued on to be drafted into the MLL or Major League Lacrosse, where he played for the Chesapeake Bayhawks for two seasons.
The PLL or Premier Lacrosse League formed in Froccaro’s third season playing professionally, and he has since gone on to play three seasons in that league.
Froccaro comes from a large family: “We all grew up playing [lacrosse] together, me, my brother, even my sister and all my cousins.” For Froccaro, his family is very “near and dear to him.” Froccaro has had a long and successful career as an athlete and he says that, “Some of the highlights for me personally … were playing alongside Jeff, my older brother, at Princeton for one year. I actually played two years with my younger brother in college.” His brothers weren’t his only role models, however. Froccaro also spoke of his father, who he said, “has always been an inspiration to me.” Despite not knowing anything about Lacrosse, Froccaro said that his father “actually learned the sport” for him and that he has “learned so much” from his father over the years.
When asked about the person he looks up to the most, Froccaro said that his biggest inspiration was his older brother Jeff: “When I was growing up, he was really my role model. He was the best athlete I ever saw in high school, and I always wanted to follow in his footsteps.”
Recently, Froccaro’s team made it to the PLL championship last year, in 2020. Despite not securing the win, Froccaro said that “just being able to play during that season, in itself, was memorable,” due to the restrictions put in place based on COVID-19. He participated in the PLL All-Star Game in San Jose, California this summer. Froccaro was also a competitor in the skills competition at the All-Star Game and won the top spot in the Fastest Shot Competition, with an unbelievable 116 mile per hour shot.
As a professional athlete from Port Washington, Froccaro hoped to be an inspiration for young athletes and offered these words to aspiring pros: “I would just say keep at it. If you’re persistent with it and you really stick with it, there’s opportunities that will open up for you. You don’t have to be the biggest or the strongest or the fastest. Lacrosse is a unique sport in that you can find your niche in it and be very good at the sport.”
—Joe Vernice is a contributing writer for Anton Media Group
