Story Links
Hello and thanks for clicking on my blog! My name is Ginger Miles and as Virginia’s women’s lacrosse volunteer assistant coach – and former goalkeeper – I’ve decided to give anyone who’s interested a behind the scenes look at life on the road with our women’s lacrosse team. We’re certainly a fun bunch and I’ll be posting weekly with the inside scoop. Thanks for reading!
**Spring Break Edition**
Sunday, March 8, 2009
It was an interesting week for the Wahoos. The Charlottesville doldrums kicked in as we returned to a half empty town from Syracuse last weekend. It was Spring Break week and most of the student body was headed off to Cancun or Palm Springs or some other such paradise to spend the week relaxing on some post card beach.
Not the Virginia women’s lacrosse team. We made full use of week with no classes with two-a-days. Now that may sound just plain unfair and terrible to some folks but it’s not too bad. If you gave the girls the option to play lacrosse all day or sit in a lecture, I’m pretty sure the vast majority would probably pick the former. Most of these girls have been playing lacrosse for the better part of their lives and haven’t ever had the opportunity to enjoy a Spring Break anyway. The girls have all accepted that it just comes with the territory of being a Division I athlete.
At least we were at home in Charlottesville the entire time and not on the road. I remember one year spending an entire Spring Break on a bus to Maryland, Penn State, Richmond and Princeton. NOW THAT’S something to feel sorry for. Charlottesville even treated us with a couple of warm sunny days (75 degrees today!) once the six inches of snow from Monday and Tuesday melted (like I said, an interesting week..)
For most of the girls, Spring Break is still a well-welcomed period with a little more free time and a break from the usual routine. They get to spend a lot more time with each other and couple nights out of the week we do nice dinners together as a team. This year, a number of the girls decided that since the beach wasn’t really an option, spray tans would be the next best thing. Half of the girls showed up to practice looking quite a few shades darker than the day before which was rather hysterical (in some cases oranger – think George Hamilton-esque if you will).
With two big games this weekend, however, much of the focus was on lacrosse and preparing for a couple of very formidable foes. We had a fast Maryland team coming into town Friday – off of a big upset in Durham – and another home game Sunday against a strong Penn State team.
Well, unfortunately, the doldrums showed up Friday night under the lights at Klckner Stadium. A vastly talented Maryland team took advantage of our sluggishness and mental errors and we found ourselves in a hole that we just couldn’t dig out of (video highlights). It was certainly a tough pill to swallow but it was something we couldn’t dwell long on. With just one practice to focus on Penn State, we needed a quick mental turnaround.
Apparently whatever was in the air on Friday was still lingering this afternoon as we faced off against Penn State. Once again, we fell behind to the undefeated Nittany Lions. At one point I was aghast to look at the scoreboard and see that we were trailing 11-5. Riding stellar goalie play and a well-executed attack, Penn State earned every goal of a wide margin and took a comfortable lead.
Today, however, would end entirely differently than Friday. Down by six goals, the girls dug deep (REALLY deep) and came together to rally the game into overtime. They showed tremendous grit as players fought all out for ground balls, clears, pressure through the midfield, timely saves and gritty goals. With a daunting six-goal deficit, it could only be a total team effort to get us back into that game and pull off the win in overtime. (Be sure to check out the photo gallery from the game)
The amount of effort and teamwork it took to win that game was awesome to see. As the old adage goes: a true test of character is not what you do when things are going well, but what you do when things are at their worst. Today wasn’t pretty lacrosse, but we proved to ourselves that when we play together we can do just about anything.
Hope to see you at a game sometime soon!
Wahoowa,
Ginger