The Harrison lacrosse team might have a new coach this year, but it doesn’t seem like the Huskies have missed a beat. On Saturday, April 1, the Huskies topped Our Lady of Lourdes 14-6 at home to improve to 3-0 on the season. Although head coach Matt Cipolla believes there is still room for growth, the performance of his squad thus far has been cause for excitement.
Matt McLaughlin had five goals and two assists to lead the Huskies past the Warriors on Saturday, while Tyler Menniti added three goals and a pair of assists. For Harrison, the biggest test on Saturday wasn’t necessarily anything that Lourdes threw at the undefeated Huskies, but how well the team bounced back from having games on successive days.
On Friday, March 31, the Huskies traveled up to Kennedy Catholic and topped the Gaels 14-8 in a rain-soaked affair, but the team showed no ill effects the following day.
“It was our first back to back, and Friday, the game was in a monsoon; not the best weather,” Cipolla said. “So it was a bit of a trial for us, seeing how we would respond to the physicality, but the way we went out there, it sets it up pretty well for us.”
Cipolla credits the team’s veterans, including McLaughlin and Menniti, for setting the tone for the younger Huskies, noting that his upperclassmen have faced their fair share of tests over the last three to four years.
“With the group we have, the core players, they’ve seen everything already,” Cipolla said. “We have a big team, a lot of new guys, and having them witness what these guys do, we should be ready for anything.”
Despite the team’s strong start, however, Cipolla said that his squad has plenty of room to grow. The team will face a good challenge on April 7, when they travel to Scarsdale to take on the Class AA Raiders, and they will need to continue to get better at several facets of the game.
“Everyone can improve individually, we don’t have any perfect players on the team and we’re always looking for that next level of improvement,” the head coach said. “But the team IQ level has been getting better each day, we need to get our stick work up, and right now, those are the two biggest things we are looking for.”
