Women’s Lacrosse Pre-Season Poll Thoughts
Sports
Annabelle Thompson ‘28
The Lake Forest Women’s Lacrosse Team is going into their second year of the Northern Athletics Collegiate Conference (NACC). They have big expectations after winning the NACC championships last year against Aurora and moving on to the NCAA tournament, winning the first round and falling in the second. They are currently polling in first place on the NACC preseason poll, 20 points ahead of second-place Aurora University. In comparison, last year, Aurora University edged them out of first place by six points.
Eva Russell, junior midfielder, says that the poll “is a good representation of where our team stands in the conference; we’ve beat all the teams in this conference, with pretty good goal differentials. But just because last year is last year, doesn’t mean we are going to have the same performance this year; we still go into every game going for a win.” she said.
The team has six first-years this year and senior Addison Kennally says that she is really excited to incorporate so many new players, “having the opportunity to have so much new talent on our team allows us the opportunities to set new records, challenge ourselves to build chemistry with so many new players, and continue building our record breaking program to be bigger than before.”
Rio Dirksen, a first-year goalie, says that when she visited last year the team was welcoming, “and I can say that when I got here, it was the exact same. It was very, very safe, welcoming and fun. The whole team is very united and you can see that on the field.” she said.
The team this year has a short bench, with twenty people on the roster, and three of them being goalies, leaving 17 people to fill 11 positions on the field. But the team is still going strong for the season.
Russell also says that they are not doing things differently this year, but are instead continuing with the success they had last year.
“Our coach never slowed up,” she said “There’s a lot of teams that go through a lull when so many seniors graduate and you don’t have a big bench. But Coach has her expectations, and we are meant to achieve them. It is difficult, but I think the pace she pushes is what will get us to our success, even with as small of a team as we have.”
Kennally agrees, saying the team has been spending time putting players in new spots on the field, allowing them to have a more dynamic and well-rounded team.
As of the writing of this article, the team has won their season opener against Illinois Wesleyan with a score of 21-6.
Poll from NACC Website naccsports.org
| Women’s Lacrosse | Points |
| Lake Forest College (18) | 198 |
| Aurora University (1) | 178 |
| Edgewood University (1) | 159 |
| Cornell College | 129 |
| Milwaukee School of Engineering | 122 |
| Concordia University Wisconsin | 98 |
| Beloit College | 87 |
| Marian University | 65 |
| Illinois Institute of Technology | 37 |
| Lawrence University | 27 |