Former Norwin soccer standout Harrigan finds satisfaction, peace in life after sports

This is the story of a “retired” soccer player with a cautionary tale to share and a message she hopes has a long reach: “It’s OK not to be OK.”

The mental demands of high-end college sports and their effects on athletes, she said, deserve more attention.

Finally healthy, Emily Harrigan played a full college soccer season last fall as a senior at Pitt after transferring from Rutgers. She called the move to Pitt “a leap of faith.”

The experience was invigorating. It was a relief. Euphoric, even.

“Life did a 180 for me,” said Harrigan, a former Norwin standout and two-time Tribune-Review Girls Soccer Player of the Year. “For the first time, I was 100% and playing for my hometown team.”

A fifth year beckoned, and she prepared for it.

“I owed it to myself,” the 22-year-old said.

But bad memories arose when she injured her left hamstring again in the spring, a reoccurring setback that had shadowed her since Rutgers. She pulled it once more in her first official practice back.

Oh no, not again.

Harrigan felt like she had earned a Division I scholarship in hamstring rehabilitation, not soccer.

“I was getting up at 5:30 in the morning, and I would run circles in a room while the other girls trained,” Harrigan said. “I was pushing myself, but I soon realized I wasn’t enjoying it as much. The risk was outweighing the reward.”

So, it became clear she had a decision to make: “It was time to hang up the cleats.”

Harrigan hearkened back to dark times at Rutgers when she was sidelined: the anxiety-filled nights, the depression, and an eating disorder.

“I was really good at putting up a front,” Harrigan said. “With social media, that is easy to do. People look at you and think everything is wonderful. But I was crying myself to sleep, kind of zoned out and obsessed with the sport.”

Things were quite different behind the scenes, “in isolation,” as she put it.

Harrigan constantly was playing catch-up. Her goal to play professionally was doused with ice-cold reality.

“Everyone goes to college thinking they are going to be a star like they were in high school,” Harrigan said. “But some athletes get a reality check, or get hurt, or have a setback and everything changes. For me, it became more of a chore.”

While she is pursuing a master’s degree at Pitt in sports science, she is free of the burden of trying to be someone she it not and the emotional baggage that comes with an incessant injury.

“A lot of people are going through the same kind of thing,” she said. “They need to know it’s OK to not be OK. It’s OK to talk to someone — a sports psychologist, a coach, whomever — about your situation.

“For the longest time, I couldn’t wrap my head around why I was facing so much adversity. But none of the things I faced made me weak. They made me stronger.”

Harrigan first tore her hamstring as a freshman at Rutgers, and it cost her six months before she tore it again the next year.

She went with intense rehab in lieu of surgery, but she also suffered a fractured right arm when a teammate ripped a shot that could not have hit her limb more directly.

All of that was a build up to the covid pandemic that trounced 2020 college sports.

“I would think to myself, ‘What am I without soccer?’ ” she said. “I was scared of change. I wanted to remember soccer on a good note.”

She left, and Rutgers made the national semifinals. Go figure.

Pitt seemed like the restart she needed, and it was, but it revealed opportunities she did not see coming.

She landed an NIL deal with aptly named Fifth Season, an automated vertical farming operation that markets salad kits.

And her social media presence attracted Gym Shark, a British fitness apparel brand. Harrigan has done some modeling for Dick’s Sporting Goods.

She also gives back by working with athletes on a personal level. She has worked with National Speed and Strength Academy in North Irwin and now trains athletes with LEG1ON Training & Performance in Pittsburgh.

“It was like I was having an identity crisis,” Harrigan said. “But I have no regrets about my decision. I am seeing my family more, going to games and supporting my girls (at Pitt). I know I did the right thing. I am living my best life outside of soccer.”