During team warm-ups, the players line up for drills. With the swift blow of a whistle it begins, and on the other end of the field the team’s goalie is getting warmed up by getting pelted with Lacrosse balls repeatedly.
This is just one of the many things players engage in during pre game warm-ups, after line drills and calisthenics, the team gets together to practice shooting on the goalie.
Although the game uses a more fitness style, the sport still features a fair amount of contact hitting. like body checking and stick pokes. Several players on the team are training exhaustively this offseason to get better at their own position and create stiff competition.
Senior Eddie Janis, one of the players training in the offseason, feels confident that they will have a successful season.
“We have a pretty good line up and a solid team,” Janis said.
The Chieftains will enter the spring with six returning seniors and among those seniors is Katlyn Wolgamott.
Katlyn Wolgamott grew up with a family that played it, inspiring her to play when she got older.
“Lacrosse is more than just a sports team, it’s like family,” senior Katlyn Wolgmatt said. “Not even just with your home team, even during games you can see players from opposite teams making friends on the field.”
Lacrosse is a sport that is growing at a very rapid rate. Between the 2008 and 2013 school years, participation in high-school lacrosse grew 19 percent among girls (to more than 77,000 players) and 15 percent among boys (to nearly 102,000 players), according to data from the National Federation of State High School Associations. Over the past decade, the trend is even stronger, with participation more than doubling over that time.
The sport has even gained a more mainstream following over the years, by being featured on the popular T.V. Show “Teen Wolf” and even being featured in a ‘5 hour energy’ commercial.
Lacrosse is a flourishing sport, and is not just for the boys.