Junior Alberta Yan and freshman Mary Gillis have faced the best of the best.
They both played, at different times, on the Tri-State All Star women’s lacrosse team while in high school. The team traveled along the East Coast, where lacrosse is more popular, and faced fierce competition.
They chose academics over varsity lacrosse at Northwestern. But a far less demanding club lacrosse team was an available outlet.
The choice was surprisingly appealing.
“I played lacrosse my whole life,” Gillis said. “The varsity level here is very intense and it takes over your life. Club lacrosse still has a competitive level of play, but it is very easy going and much less of a time commitment.”
Many club sports athletes were high school standouts. Many of them wanted to continue playing competitively, even if they did not make the school’s varsity team.
But for club women’s lacrosse – a group of girls committed and competitive earlier in their career – winning is not the team’s main priority.
“Club lacrosse is about having fun being a team,” sophomore Ellie Barczak said. “There are many individual girls who are talented and come from very high achieving high school teams. But the level of competition is comparable to a good high school team. It’s definitely for people who love the sport in high school and just want to keep playing and pick up a stick.”
The Wildcats are a team built around the premise of simply enjoying the sport over putting in countless hours of practice, as they might have in high school.
With time management as a pressing issue, and academics as a priority, the Cats are comfortable knowing their program is very relaxed and lenient even if they don’t win every game.
“The team is relatively new as far as (playing on a) club team goes,” Yan said. “The bothersome (aspect of not being competitive) is mitigated because we are at a difficult school and we have all made the decision that school work comes first. We stress that to the younger team members. If they have a pressing exam or paper, we want them to do well on it because lacrosse always comes second. We try to make sure the transition from high school to college is as smooth as possible.”
With the talent on the club team, some players might be bothered that the squad is not as competitive as their high school team was. Women’s club lacrosse finished this season 3-6 in the Women’s Collegiate Lacrosse League, failing to make the playoffs.
But with a busy school schedule, they are comfortable with just having fun on the field.
“I know over past the few years, it has been a very easygoing atmosphere,” Gillis said. “We do have a lot of added talent on the team, and we have been more competitive playing other teams. But we are still laid back and have no pressure to win every game we play.”
While winning may not be a priority, the Cats are still looking to improve their play on the field one step at a time. NU’s 2007 season included only one win. But the team improved thanks to the incoming freshmen class.
Veteran players are confident that the younger players will continue the team’s progression from this season.
“The freshmen on the team are outstanding,” Barczak said. “They are the core of the team, and are getting better and better. We do have extremely gifted upperclassmen, but we always have a handful of freshmen at every practice and game. If we were more organized, with more practices, we could be extremely competitive and we can grow into a very real club sport.”
