McLean Lacrosse has had a mediocre start to the season with a 1-3 record. A major contributing factor to this record is seven injured players including both team captains.
“Injures are our downfall this year,” senior varsity captain Patrick Downey said. “We have had key positions and players out, which is our biggest weakness.”
Due to these injuries, the McLean Boys Lacrosse team continues their regular season with a loss against Centreville High School earlier this week.
“Our team played well in the first quarter; we played tight defense and we were able to keep the play on their side of the field,” sophomore midfielder Isaac Bell said. “That helped us keep Centreville’s score at zero while we had opportunities to pull ahead.”
Centreville played some tough defense against the Highlander’s offense.
“We have a lot of really good individual players,” long-stick midfielder Kaelan Ferris said. “We need to work on playing more as a team and putting our trust in each other to make the plays happen.”
At the end of the first half, the Highlanders trailed the Chargers 2 to 7. Tensions were high going into the third quarter when the team had to try and pull out a win. However, their offense wasn’t able to pull through.
“We have a lot of shooters on offense and once we get good possessions and we get rolling we’re pretty hard to stop,” Ferris said.
The issue for the Highlanders was getting the offense rolling at all. McLean ended up losing to Centreville with a final score of 4 to 9. The Highlanders offensive downfall was mostly attributed to injury, however McLax is working on making up for those absences.
“We’ve been working hard in practice everyday trying to get better because there’s things we need to work on to get us ready for some of our bigger opponents we see later on in the season,” Ferris said.
With the next match against Oakton over spring break on April 4, they hope to improve their record of wins and losses and pull ahead. The season is flying by quickly with players already thinking ahead about what McLax needs to do to have success in the postseason. They hope to come together as a team to make use of all the individual talent they have and become a presence in the district.
“The end goal for our team is to win districts,” Downey said.
However, the district is full of competitive teams and a defending state champion.
“We have some pretty good competition in our district but Yorktown is going to be our biggest threat,” Ferris said.
Yorktown, being the defending state champions, are going to be a large obstacle to overcome, but McLean is hoping to pull through.
“I’m really optimistic for the season,” parent Brian Hancock said. “I think we’re just getting going and haven’t even unlocked our full potential yet, so I can’t wait for the games coming up this week and the rest of the season.”
Hopefully in the upcoming practices and games the Highlanders can come together to become a presence in the district like they can be.
“We have the potential to make an impact this season,” Ferris said.
