The budding men’s lacrosse team at Seton Hill University (SHU) believes they have a strong season in store this year, their second full season as a team. With a new assistant coach, Peter DeSantis, and a larger team, they feelsas if they will have a much better season than last year, even though they are playing reportedly better teams this season.
The team has grown from the 17 players of last season to a total of 32, which the players feel will have a strong positive impact on the team.
By John Fish,
Contributor
The budding men’s lacrosse team at Seton Hill University (SHU) believes they have a strong season in store this year, their second full season as a team. With a new assistant coach, Peter DeSantis, and a larger team, they feelsas if they will have a much better season than last year, even though they are playing reportedly better teams this season.
The team has grown from the 17 players of last season to a total of 32, which the players feel will have a strong positive impact on the team.
�Our team is a lot bigger and it feels like we could be a lot more competitive,� said David Royce, a sophomore and returning player to the team.
�We had no subs last year so by half-time we had no energy,� added Chris Horigan, another sophomore returning player.
�Last year, we relied heavily on our freshmen to get us through,� said head coach Brian Novotny. Only five of the 17 original players are sophomores and only one a junior. Some of those freshmen the team was depending on had never even played lacrosse before. But that has changed for this season, with many of the original players returning and a fresh line of recruits. �I think the future’s very bright,� Novotny said.
�Any time you have a players at a young age, they gain experience and grow as a team,� he said.
Brian Kusterer, a senior goalie leaving the team after this season, had this to say about the team’s growth: �Even though our record doesn’tshow it, we�ve definitely moved leaps and bounds since last year.� However, their record so far, which consists only of pre-season Fall Ball, is not that bad. In the first of two tournaments, the team played the University of Michigan, Michigan State University and Wheeling Jesuits University. Though they lost each of these games, they did so by marginal scores.
In the secon tournament, in which they played the University of Pittsburgh, Bishop University, a Canadian team, and Carnegie Mellon University. They won two of these games, losing to Bishop University by only one point.
As for their target for the season this year, Novotny said, �We�d love to be 500.� 500 means that the team wins exactly half of their games. The players believe 75 percent of their games is a more noble, if harder to achieve, goal.
Even with their improvements, there are still some things the team would like to see made better. For example, George Hurley, a freshman, would like to be able to �go to the weight room without coaches.� The team is unable to workout in the field house without the supervision of a coach.
�If we can’tlift without a coach,� added Horigan. �They should put more equipment in the McKenna Center.� As for request, he then added, �I think every team would like to see lights on the turf.�
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