Credit to Taylor Griffin

Varsity lacrosse player during gametime.

When tryouts for sports start to come around the corner, some athletes have the anxiety of making the team they want in their minds. They get nervous, may not play as well in tryouts, or lose sleep. This, however, is not the case for the girls’ lacrosse team here at North. In the most recent years, girls’ lacrosse as a sport has been on an uprise. You see more club teams, and stronger and bigger high school teams. This uprise seemed to hit our girls’ team a little before everyone elses and now the team and Head Coach Rowan Pugh struggle for numbers.

“ I think this season the girls have to be more prepared for our schedule when it comes to record than what we have been used to. We are a super young and small team going against a lot of pretty big and older programs in our area, so being able to push through adversity and still work on our skills so that in the next couple of years we have a really solid older team,” Pugh said.

The biggest worry for most of the players is the strain it takes on their bodies and the newfound pressure on their shoulders. Junior Jocelyn Kuker has been with the team through the highs and now the lows and feels all of the new responsibilities this year holds.

“I think the hardest thing about having low numbers is the strain on our players,” Kuker said. “Our midfielders have to cover most of the field, not just one area, so it has more pressure on them and more responsibility since they don’t have the support and subs.”

Due to the lack of players on the team, wins and losses aren’t what they use to define their team and what they have worked for. What success means to them is a lot more than what the scoreboard shows. It’s personality and player development, and that is what the team hopes to get out of this season.

“I think every season is about player growth to me. I don’t really care about the wins or losses, to be honest,” Pugh said. “I think when you grow as an individual, you grow as a team.”