LONDON EYE: Katie Reinprecht looks for an opening in action for the U.S. national field hockey team. Rising Princeton University senior star Reinprecht recently made the U.S. Olympic squad and will be heading to the London Games in a few weeks. (Photo courtesy of USA Field Hockey/Yuchen Nie)

Over her first three years with the Princeton University field hockey team, Katie Reinprecht distinguished herself as a gifted playmaker.

The midfielder from North Wales, Pa. was the Ivy League Player of the Year as a freshman and sophomore and earned first-team All-America honors as a sophomore and junior.

But Reinprecht knew she had to raise the level of her game if she was going to make the U.S. team for the 2012 London Olympics.

“The international game is a lot different; it is a lot faster and your skills have to be a lot sharper,” said Reinprecht, who piled up 44 goals and 31 assists in the first three years of the Tiger career. “You don’t have as much time on the ball.”

As a result, Reinprecht put her senior season at Princeton on hold and moved to San Diego last summer to train with the U.S. national team for the 2011-12 campaign.

Throwing herself into the team’s arduous conditioning routine, Reinprecht has seen the benefits.

“The training regimen depends on the day,” said Reinprecht. “We do lifting, running, and scrimmaging. We do long runs and a lot of different running workouts. We have sessions where we just work on corners. I would like to think I am the most fit I have ever been.”

The work was made a little easier for Reinprecht with the presence of her sister Julia, a rising junior star for the Tigers together with Princeton teammates Kat Sharkey and Michelle Cesan.

“It was nice to have friends but it was even better to have my sister there,” said Reinprecht. “We are best friends; it is nice to have a family member to share things with.”

Reinprecht got to share the joy of making the 16-player U.S. team with her sister. “The majority of the team wanted to hear face-to-face,” said Reinprecht, who will also be joined in London by teammate Cesan, an alternate on the squad with Sharkey not making the team.

“We found out on Saturday and the team was announced on Monday. The whole week there was added pressure and nerves. I was shaking going into the room. It was a remarkable feeling when I found out I was going; it was like a weight off of my shoulders. Julia went in right before me and was standing in the hall. The coaches told me, by the way, Julia is going too.”

The U.S. squad didn’t have to wait until the summer to find out if was going to the Olympics as the team qualified by virtue of topping Argentina 4-2 in the Pan American Games gold medal contest last October.

“Winning the Pan Am games was huge for a number of reasons,” said Reinprecht.

“Argentina was the No. 1 team in the world at the time. It was huge to know that we were in the Olympics and we didn’t have to focus on qualifying. We could start preparing. It made it easier to get games against the best teams since they knew we were going to be in the Olympics.”

Reinprecht is prepared to go hard when she is on the field. “I am an attacking midfielder,” said Reinprecht. “I am a two-way player; I am back on defense a lot.”

Even though the U.S. is ranked 10th in the world rankings, it isn’t about to back down.

“It is something we have been saying since we have qualified, we don’t want to go there and just be happy to be there,” said Reinprecht.

“We want to get on the medal stand. We have to live in the moment and enjoy the experience but not get distracted.”

The U.S. will face some tough foes in its Olympic Pool B, which includes No. 2 Argentina, No. 3 Germany, No. 6 New Zealand, No. 7 Australia, and No. 12 South Africa. The squad will open the summer games by playing Germany on July 29. The top two teams in each pool will advance to the semifinals which will take place on August 8 with the gold medal game slated for August 10.

In Reinprecht’s view, the team’s success depends on taking care of the little things.

“At this level, it comes down to the small details because the teams are all good,” said Reinprecht.

“We need to put the ball in when we are dominating possession. It makes such a difference to get ahead. We need to capitalize on our opportunities.”