Farewell to Florida!

We concluded our last full day of pre-season with a great contest against Loomis. We were a little slow in the beginning, but we were able to focus in and put together some great plays on offense, after holding them in the defensive end. There was a pretty long stretch of time when we were dominating draw controls and possession. It was nice to feel things start to click into place. We packed up that night and most of us got right to bed to wake up very early for a 5 AM departure to the airport from the lovely Tradewinds. After a week off for the remainder of Spring Break, we were able to practice on our home field today at Brooks. It felt nice to be on our field for the first time in 2010 and once we got playing at game speed, we continued to build on our foundation that we had made in FL. Be sure to come to some of our games this season. We would love the support!

The Last Day Already

We can’t believe that it’s the last day already! For our team outing last night to the movies, we shared a bus with Loomis Chaffee and saw Remember Me. Upon returning to the hotel, we had an impromptu dance-off with the Loomis girls in the lobby. Loomis definitely stole the show with their impressive dance moves, but we hope to dominate on the field in our scrimmage against them tonight. For now, we’re enjoying our last bagged lunch and preparing for our last afternoon practice. We will have some pictures up later on today, so be sure to check back and take a look.

Happy St. Patrick's Day! After a tough match up against Middlesex last night, we all came back to the hotel and shared pizza with them in celebration of our friendly rivalry! We had another fun filled day waking up at 6:30 for an early morning practice. Although everyone's a bit sore, we all pulled together to focus in for a great morning practice where we perfected our passing and off ball defense. We all knew it was a successful morning when Coach Hesse yelled in excitement about our unstoppable defense! We bounced back again in the afternoon where we were able to have a full field scrimmage between our own green and white teams. Later on in practice we also had the pleasure of working with Coach Jamie Munro, who was recently the coach for the Denver men's lax team. He showed us some great dodges and fakes that we are able to use in the 8 meter to score more effectively. After a long day, Coach Hesse and Bobo both decided to give us the evening off so we could go to the movies together as a team. Hope you're having as much fun as we are! Keep it lax...

Live, Lax, Love

It's only our second full day and already things are coming together. Within each session the team is improving on our defense and adapting well to our offensive setup. We are so excited to finally be in Florida and getting to know the new players. Last night we had our first scrimmage against Bryn Mawr, a top prep-school in Maryland, which was great competition. We fought hard and found things to work on for the rest of the week. Today we had an early start with an 8 o'clock practice and a scrimmage against Westminster at 9. It's been a little chilly in Florida but luckily our new warmup shirts arrived today at lunch. Now we're off to the fields again for afternoon practice! We end our day with a scrimmage against Middlesex, one of our friendly rivals from home. Until then... keep it lax :)

Last day: Brooks 8, Deerfield 8

Our last day of the trip began with an early morning practice that focused on sliding and team defense.  After lunch in the snack shack, we met in Liv's room and gave out markers and blank  T-shirts.  Each player designed a personalized shirt for one of her teammates.

In the afternoon we faced Deerfield in a full-length game.  We'd played them already in the round robin and done well against them, but in today's game they fielded a much tougher lineup.  After two halves of physical, back-and-forth lacrosse we found ourselves down two goals with less than a minute to play.  Even though we were playing man down from a yellow card, we scored, won the draw, and scored again in the final seconds to pull out an 8-8 tie.  While there's clearly a lot we still need to work on, it felt good to end our preseason with such clutch play.

After the game, the team got together for a team dinner at Panera and a visit to Coldstone Creamery courtesy of Mr. Lamb (another team parent).  With a terrific preseason behind us, we're looking forward to an exciting season!

Old Friends Make Headlines

It's always fun at this time of year to follow former Brooks players in the college ranks.  This was a great week for Brooks lacrosse alums, several of whom made headlines at their colleges:

Sewell Robinson '08

Katie Herter '08

Jenn Russell '06

Whit Hagerman '05

One day, Six games!

Today was filled with competition. Despite the soggy weather the team continued to play with intensity and spirit. To start off the day we played a full game against Westminster and pulled off a decisive win with a score of 17-11. For our meal we went to the Cheesecake Factory to fuel up for our round robin jamboree. We played five twenty-five minute games (the equivalent of two and a half regulation games) against Loomis Chaffee, Kent Denver, Sacred Heart, Rye Country Day and Deerfield. With so much game time there were multiple opportunities for every player to show their talent. Especially after the round robin it was obvious that the younger players were rising to the level of the returners. We quickly got out of the rain to return for a meeting in the snack shack to end the day.