Club Sports: Seniors help lacrosse team transform

Four years ago, the Pitt club lacrosse team wan’t committed to winning. Instead, senior… Four years ago, the Pitt club lacrosse team wan’t committed to winning. Instead, senior captain Chris Gorham said, the Panthers seemed to play for fun.

But during the past four seasons, Gorham and his classmates have worked to change that mentality, and now, in his final season, Gorham said he has seen the club’s transformation from a team in shambles to a successful program.

He wants to see that progression continue.

“We want this program to be serious,” he said. “We’ve set the example. We’ve said this is what Pitt lacrosse is.”

Head coach Alex Perry said the team’s players are “light-years ahead of where they were last year.” The Panthers — a Division I club team — are 7-1-1 overall with a 4-1 record in the Central Collegiate Lacrosse Association, which consists of eight Division I teams and 19 Division II teams from Indiana, Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania.

Club sports teams compete with teams from other universities, but their athletes aren’t on athletic scholarships, and the teams aren’t governed by the NCAA.

Pitt lacrosse’s only loss this season came against then-No. 12 Michigan State, 17-16, but Pitt scored three goals in the last two minutes of the game to force overtime. The close score was a change from past meetings against the Spartans.

Michigan State ended Pitt’s season in the conference playoffs last year. During the 19-3 defeat, Perry said that the Spartans ran up the score and left their starters in for the entire game.

“They disrespected us last year,” Perry said. “Plain and simple.”

Senior captain Nick Ruff said the team’s performances against Michigan State and 12-10 win against No. 10 Buffalo the night before show how the far team has come in four years.

Pitt hasn’t beaten Buffalo in 10 years and Michigan State also defeated Pitt two years ago in the playoffs by the lopsided score of 18-3.

Senior captain Nick Ruff said that during his freshman year the team lacked chemistry, which hurt the Panthers when they played tough opponents or tried to earn a come-from-behind win.

He said that the close-knit nature of the team off the field this season deserves a large amount of credit for its improved performance on the field.

“A lot of the team did not hang out outside of playing [before],” Ruff said. “However, now the team is extremely close, and we don’t need to make it a point to hang out outside of playing because we are all really good friends, which makes for great team chemistry.”

Despite the improvement on the field and off, team members said that they will only view the season as a success if they qualify for the Men’s Collegiate Lacrosse Association national championships. The MCLA is a national organization consisting of more than 200 club lacrosse programs.

In order to qualify, the team must win either the CCLA conference playoffs or receive an automatic bid from the MCLA. Automatic bids are given out on the basis of a team’s record, victories over ranked opponents and strength of schedule. The team’s ability and willingness to travel also play a factor.

Sixteen teams qualify for the MCLA tournament, which will be held in Greenville, S.C., this season.

While Ruff said that chemistry between team members has greatly improved Pitt’s chances of reaching the MCLA tournament, Gorham said that discipline has played a definitive role in the team’s success as well.

A 24-hour “no alcoholic substances” rule before games — not in place during his freshman year — has increased clarity on the field, Gorham said, and has provided opportunities for team bonding.

Transfers have also helped the team improve, as they have aided the group’s restructuring efforts by bringing an element of seriousness.

Junior captain Tyler Novotny played Division I NCAA lacrosse at St. John’s for a year before enrolling at Pitt the spring semester of last year. Novotny has amassed a team-high 36 goals and averages 5.88 points per game.

He said he’s seen a marked improvement in the team’s work ethic over the past year.

“This year we’ve really taken everything a lot more seriously,” Novotny said. “Everyone’s not cashing in for the summer like they were last year going into the playoffs.”

The team practices four times a week: Mondays and Wednesdays in the Cost Sports Center on upper campus, often going from midnight to 2 a.m., and Tuesdays and Thursdays on the intramural fields behind the Cost Center.

The team has finished league play, and a likely rematch with Michigan State in the conference tournament awaits. The match will decide who wins the conference’s automatic bid to the MCLA national tournament.

“We have the skill and depth to beat Michigan State in the conference tourney; we just need to come out harder in the first half so we do not have to play catch up with them,” Novotny said. “We had a solid game plan before; we just need to execute it again with some minor tweaks, and we can win.”

Unlike in the last couple of years, Michigan State didn’t overwhelm the Panthers in the teams’ first matchup, and Novotny said he and his teammates didn’t see anything from the Spartans that they wouldn’t be able to handle.

But Ruff acknowledged that the team can’t afford to overlook its remaining non-league regular-season games.

The team has no home games left. Two of the five games remaining are against No. 13 Boston College and No. 17 Northeastern on back-to back days in Boston. Dates with rivals West Virginia and Carnegie Mellon University also loom.

Victories in Boston would greatly improve the team’s chances of receiving an at-large bid to the MCLA tournament, if one is necessary. Ruff feels the team is within striking distance of its goal.

“We are right there, knocking on the door,” he said. “We just need to stay focused and keep playing hard.”