Men's club lacrosse among nation's best

Despite the ill-fated varsity men's lacrosse season this spring, Tiger fans still had one dominant men's lacrosse team to cheer for: the club squad, which completed an undefeated regular season before being upset by Westchester in the national tournament quarterfinals last week.

Ironically, it's the varsity team's tradition of success that is at least partly responsible for the club team's prowess. Though club lacrosse does not benefit from formal recruiting, plenty of talented players still show up at the team's stall during the activities fair each fall.

"The team is a healthy size because our varsity team is so good that there are a lot of good players who can't play varsity," senior officer Athan Biss said.

And there's nothing wrong with playing club, especially if you're on the team that made it to the Elite Eight in the National Championships.

With a 27-man roster and a relaxed practice schedule, the club team may not look like an elite championship team. But over the past few years, it has played like one.

Princeton has routinely beaten teams with several advantages over them, including school funding and a coaching staff. The team was most excited about its wins against several southern teams, including George Mason and the aggressive Midshipmen of the Naval Academy, last year's national champions.

Yet the team was in relative shambles just three years ago, current players say.

"It was a joke," Biss said, recalling his freshman season. "There was a 30-pack on the side of the field."

The team enjoyed a rennaissance under graduate student coach Pete McGraw.

"We made this run all the way to the nationals," Biss said. "We won our playoff game two years ago to go down to the Final Four, and it was a Miracle on Ice."

McGraw is gone now, but the Tigers are still benefiting from his influence. Their success has continued despite the lack of a rigorous practice schedule.

"Our team is pretty flexible," Biss said. "In the fall, we have much fewer practices: only twice a week on Mondays and Wednesdays. If we can get a third one in, we go for a game."

Get the best of the ‘Prince’ delivered straight to your inbox. Subscribe now »

In addition to fall practices, the team participates in tournaments such as Maryland's Fall Brawl and takes a longer trip one weekend in the autumn. This past fall, the club team played Cornell and other western New York teams, dominating all of them.

The Tigers' roster is mainly composed of underclassmen, featuring just two seniors. They boast one grad student, however — Josh Graber, a fifth-year student in the MAE department.

"It's great to come to practice and see this grad student appearing out of the woods, kind of sketchy," Biss said. "We also used to have a grad student coach, but he left, so now we really coach ourselves."

Unlucky break

After lacking a dominant scoring threat last year, freshman attack Kevin Block provided that presence this season. The Tigers also separated themselves from their competition with their solid D-line.

"If you have that component, it will set you apart," Biss said. "We have very athletic defensemen that are our core."

In regular-season play, Princeton appeared on target to win the National Championships this year, but the Tigers dropped their Elite Eight game to Westchester on April 13. This means that they will not attend the Final Four in Maryland this coming weekend.

The loss came as a significant surprise, given the club's earlier success — it was 9-0 before the Westchester game. The road trip provided the team's toughest competition of the year.

"Maryland is where it's at," Biss said. "We would've won the last tournament in Maryland, except it lightninged in the last game, so we had to call it."

Against Westchester, though, the Tigers' luck finally ran out, as they lost 12-9.

"We thought we were a better team, but they were super-organized," freshman attack Tommy McKay said. "They had been practicing a lot more often, and they have a coach. Only two years ago they were a varsity program."

Westchester cut the funding for the team; it is now a club sport by letter but a varsity sport in spirit.

"We had a heartbreaking loss. We just didn't play very well overall," Biss said. "They are a very good team. They were in better shape than us. They had all the components to beat us."

The Tigers were led by Graber, who notched an impressive six goals.

"He was getting the ball and ripping shots," Biss said.

Other key performers included Biss, Block and, on defense, sophomore Greg Schundler.

"It was back-and-forth throughout the game, but they always had a oneor two-goal lead," McKay said.

"A lot of us were assuming that we were going into the final round," Biss said. "We looked past the game, but we really could've beaten the team: no question in our minds. Losing didn't really occur to us until halftime, when they were ahead of us by four."

The loss to Westchester wasn't the Tigers' only recent unfortunate Elite Eight performance.

"Just like in our lacrosse tournament, we lost to Health and Fitness — I don't even think they're a real club — in the Elite Eight of the Dodgeball Tournament," Biss said. "It was almost as heartbreaking."