Chatter fills the air as the lacrosse players make their way onto the field, eager to start practice.

After practicing all fall, the athletes will be placed into teams in the lacrosse season.

The students enjoy playing the sport for a variety of reasons.

“I’m really competitive,” Bird said. “When you play on the field and you’re in contact with all the other girls, you can get the aggression out on the field, and you know you don’t seem like you’re being mean to your teammates, you’re just being competitive.”

Lacrosse also requires a lot of skill.

“It’s a game of skill as opposed to brutality,” assistant Junior Varsity Coach Lardon said. “It really is a beautiful dance. It’s not a forceful game, it’s an assertive game, and it’s a real high skill set. I think it’s one of the highest, if not the highest skill set there is.”

Both the Bowie girls’ team and guys’ team consist of a junior varsity and a varsity.

“Varsity is a little more intense [in terms of practicing],” junior Craig Johnson said. “JV is a little more laid back with more fundamental work, to develop skills for varsity.”

There are no official tryouts for lacrosse, instead, everyone plays and is put either on junior varsity or varsity.

“We practice together all fall,” Lardon said. “By the time January comes around, we pretty much know their skill sets. The primary concern is filling a varsity of the best athletes that we have. It’s kind of like whatever is leftover is designated the JV team, however, usually entry level players are going to be designated to the JV, because they just don’t have experience.”

Some of the students like the fact that there are no tryouts.

“The whole lacrosse atmosphere is very welcoming,” said Bird. “It’s not like you’re competing with other girls for a spot, because everyone has a spot. It’s very welcoming and it’s more like a family and you know, you don’t feel pressured to make a team or anything like that.”

The process is the same for the guys’ team as well.

“There’s no one that doesn’t get put on a team,” Johnson said. “Honestly, [there’s not much stress because] you pretty much know what team you’re going to be on from the get go.”

Playing lacrosse helps players in more than just physical ways.

“They learn teamsmanship,” Lardon said. “They learn accepting defeat, accepting victory with honor, respecting the game and your opponents. There’s life skills in this, I mean, these are skills, not just physical skills, but emotional and mental skills that they’ll take with them for their life.”

The girls who have played longer often help out the girls who are just starting out.

“When we practice with them, we’re always open to their questions and giving them advice,” Bird said. “If they have anything they are confused about, we are always there to help them out with that.”

Lacrosse isn’t offered as a class at Bowie, so practice is done outside of school, and the schedule differs slightly for each team.

“This year we practice Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday.” sophomore Kaedon Solana said. “They’re an hour and a half typically.”

Some students also devote time outside of school practice to work on their skills.

“Most of the long distance conditioning is stuff that we have to do on our own.” Bird said. “I spend my own time either going to the gym and working out or running outside to help my endurance, because we are running all over the field all the time.”

The lacrosse players train in a variety of ways.

“At home you have to play ‘wall ball’ a lot,” Solana said. “That’s where you just throw the ball and catch it. At practice, you usually just work on drills and scenario stuff and do a lot of conditioning.”

The athletes get to experience a lot by being on the team.
“It’s such a great opportunity for these young women,” Lardon said. “They get to expand their horizons, to find their successes.”