First year team boys’ varsity lacrosse has high hopes for the season under the new leadership of head coach Jamie Riedel.

This year the new captains consist of sophomores Brooks Long, Austin Julian, Blake Bennett and freshman Lance Bradley.

Leading scorer Blake Bennett feels the season has been “alright” despite the losses. Bennett said he understands the youthfulness of the team and has high hopes for future games and seasons as the team works together to become a high position team.

With a rough first start, the team put a strong fight against Garner on March 15. The final score came out to be 10-7 with a cougar loss. The team was up 7-5 going into the fourth quarter but Garner came back to win the game.

Sophomore Goalie Evan Moran feels that the game would have ended differently if the team would have kept their cool in the fourth quarter when Garner came back to tie the game.

“Garner started catching up to us and we just lost our confidence and everyone went downhill with their play and attitudes.” junior Mitchell Piechocki said.

The team felt frustrated towards the end when nothing seemed to be going their way.

“I think what caused us to lose is towards the end when we kept getting penalties and our offense couldn’t produce.” Bennett said.

Friday March 19, the team played its most competitive game this season against Sanderson. Despite losing 10-7, sophomore Charlie Byrd felt pleased with the team’s performance.

“I felt really confident in our play. We were really physical and made Sanderson work hard for the win,” Byrd said.

Goals were scored by freshman Jackson Hackney, sophomores Blake Bennett, Brooks Long, Austin Julian, junior Logan Harris and senior Kimon Small.

“It’s the first time I’ve scored. I was glad I was able to help out the team in that way,” Small said.

Sophomore Jordan Mcdonald said that the teams play so far has exceeded their expectations of how they believed the season would go and confidence in the team has risen since the beginning of the season.

Despite the rough start, Mcdonald has high hopes for future seasons of varsity lacrosse.

Mcdonald said, “My hopes for years to come is that we can become Cap-8 champs and become a strong opponent.”