An opportunity for growth: NGU lacrosse teams play in fall games
Ian Johnson, Sports Editor
Photo courtesy of Robbie Gawrys
With many of North Greenville University’s fall sports finishing their seasons, several of the school’s spring sports have been busy prepping during their off-season. For the lacrosse teams, they have held some practices and even played in some scrimmages.
Men’s lacrosse head coach Corey Struss said, “[The Fall semester] for us, it’s a lot. We are practicing and lifting four or five days a week.”
The practice schedule can vary at times due to the many teams using the fields throughout the semester. Recently, the team has been practicing at 5:30 a.m., while at the beginning of the semester they practiced at 5:30 p.m.
“The fall is challenging for our guys, but it’s really important for development both individually but also from the team perspective,” said Struss.
The fall is important for the team as it allows them to begin putting in their system and game plan for the season. For the young players, the fall helps them adjust to playing college lacrosse.
“[College lacrosse] It’s a higher level, higher speed and a little more urgency,” said Struss.
Each fall semester, a series of games is played against other schools around the upstate South Carolina area. These games, often called “fall ball,” allow them to gauge where the team is at. The games also give the players a chance to play against outside competition.
Every team plans its fall games differently depending on what the coach hopes to get out of the games.
“We always try to get a high-level team in the fall, to humble us a little bit [and] show what we’re not so good at,” said Struss.
The men’s team played a variety of opponents across all levels of collegiate lacrosse. The trailblazers played DI opponent Queen’s University of Charlotte, top-ranked DII team Newberry College and University of South Carolina’s club lacrosse team, which is one of the best club teams in the country. The team finished their fall schedule against Tusculum University.
For Struss, he tries to get everyone playing time in order to see where each player is good at and where improvement is needed.
“We’re going to play a lot of our young guys, but against Newberry, it’s going to be our top end guys. It’s going to be as if we’re playing a game this spring,” said Struss.
For the women’s lacrosse team, the approach to fall ball is similar.
Women’s lacrosse head coach Sydney Taylor said, “It’s just nice to have other outside competition.”
Taylor explained how by playing against each other, the team gets used to how each other play and often times don’t play as hard against their friends.
“When we are seeing other teams, we’re seeing different skills, different speeds. It teaches you how to adapt quickly,” said Taylor.
The team began the fall schedule by playing conference opponent Belmont Abbey College.
“For the fall, we try to get everybody in to see where everyone is, especially the new girls,” said Taylor. “You never know what you’re going to get until you see them on the field.”
On Oct. 18, the Trailblazers played against three opponents across a seven-hour span. The team played against Emmanuel University, Gardner-Webb University and Newberry College.
Even though the team had to play multiple games in a short span, they had an hour in between each game. The games were 45 minutes long instead of the usual 60-minute game time.
“It’s a lot of reps, a lot of running and a lot of movement, but it is a shortened version of the game,” said Taylor.
One of the most difficult parts of these games was the mental aspect of the games.
“One game can be super chill, like I’m not getting pushed a lot [and] in the next game I’m getting pushed to the ground,” said Taylor. “Mentally it’s a workout as well.”
While the fall games play a key part in building the mentality and skills of the teams, Coach Struss makes sure to remind players what to take from these games.
Struss said, “We tell the guys all the time, ‘fall is fool’s gold.’ If you win big, you’re still 0-0, there’s still work to do, and even if you get crushed by a team, you’re not as bad as you think.
“There’s a lot of work to be done, and there’s a lot of skill that we can make up between now and February sixth [the start of the season],” said Struss.
