Great first win of the season over Richmond today by a score of 10-9. The Spiders are a perennial league power and preseason nationally ranked team. They are just coming off a big win last week over ranked North Carolina. The Paladin defense is beginning to jell in time for SoCon play and several freshmen made significant contributions. Coach Meade may have found a real "dodger" scorer in Jarrett Birch who netted two goals today and contributed to good ball movement as well. Meade plays a murderous OOC schedule but it looks like it might pay off as it did last year when we tied for the league championship. SoCon play continues this week with away games at VMI and Mercer.
Men's LAX beats Richmond
I actually watched the second half while enjoying a beautiful afternoon sitting on the patio. I still don’t understand the rules, but it was fun to watch.
Once you get a basic understanding of the rules and strategy of the game (similar to Basketball & Hockey) LAX is a really fun game to watch. Constant action with very few time outs, lots of scoring, big momentum swings and the face off after every goal concept allows for dramatic comebacks. The players are incredible athletes with size not being as large a factor as it is in so many other games. Lacrosse is becoming a very popular game in the South with more high school and junior programs being started each year. Lots of really good H.S. athletes who want to continue sports in college but are barred by size considerations are switching to LAX from BB and football as their primary sport. The Furman roster is full of HS all stars from other sports; many of them sporting very impressive academic achievements as well. And right now the colleges that play the game tend to be the better academic schools with many smaller, private institutions like Furman. Schools like Johns Hopkins, Loyola of Baltimore, many of the Ivies, Bryant, Albany, Duke etc. are frequently contenders for the national championship. No SEC, no Power 5, etc. By the way, the rules are not nearly as difficult or complex as many of the more familiar sports. When a ball goes in the net, it's a goal. We dont have to watch 15 minutes of replays to determine whether the reciever did or did not CATCH the ball.