News & Features Editor
Clermont, Fla., is about 20 miles west of Orlando, 620 miles south of Raleigh, NC., and 1,240 miles from Springfield, Mass. Two weeks ago, the Springfield College men’s lacrosse team took the journey to Clermont to play a game against Bowdoin College.
Despite two goals from Brendan Dooley and a goal within the first two minutes of the game from Tim Cozens for the Pride, the Polar Bears responded with four unanswered goals to take a 4-1 lead after the first quarter. Bowdoin would never lose grip of the lead again and went to claim a 13-5 victory.
“Bowdoin was a tough game for us, but it gave us a chance to learn from our failure,” junior Matthew LaCroix said. “Coach Sullivan says failure is the fertilizer for success and we feel that we took that out of this game.”
Despite the loss, the Pride were still able to enjoy the trip. The trip that the lacrosse team takes each year acts as a bonding experience—a time to get to know the other players more and spend some quality time with the team.
Throughout the week, players watched movies together, watched lacrosse together, and dueled it out in card games.
“Our favorite part of the trip was bonding with the team,” LaCroix said. “We spent our time relaxing and hanging out with the team.”
However, LaCroix pointed out that while non-athletes are on spring break, enjoying a lot of beach time, the lacrosse team still treats their spring break as a business trip. The team practiced for two hours on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday and watched film before practice on Tuesday.
When there was more free time, players used it to get away from the hotel.
“Tuesday we went to our teammate Logan Tormey’s house (his family lives in Florida) for a team dinner and spent some time bonding there,” LaCroix said. “Some of us also got the chance to see our own family or grandparents down there during our free time.”
After returning from the trip to sunny Florida, the Pride got right back to work. They tried to build off of their mistakes against Bowdoin to improve as a team. Springfield returned to Stagg Field for the first time since Feb. 24 to take on Endicott College.
The Pride grinded out an overtime win behind three goals from Tom Hurley to halt the four-game losing streak. However, after the win, the Pride lost their next two games against Western New England and Amherst 14-10 and 15-7 respectively.
The two losses drop Springfield’s record to 2-6 overall. However, Coach Keith Bugbee enjoys playing a tough schedule early on. He says it prepares his team for the conference schedule. Last year, the Pride had a similar start to the season as they won three of their first 10 games.
However, last year concluded with championship t-shirts and the hoisting of a NEWMAC trophy, so there is no need for the Pride to panic.
The Pride take the field again on Saturday when they face off against Babson.