Senior Addison Price and freshman Lauren Trent have set wheels in motion to bring a bit of culture to Murray State with the introduction of a club lacrosse team.
The sport of lacrosse is predominantly played in private schools around the country.
“It’s a very Ivy League-type sport,” Price said. “It’s another thing we could do to promote ourselves as an Ivy League school.”
Lacrosse is big in the North and the South and is an up-and-coming sport in Kentucky, Trent said.
In fact, the closest professional lacrosse team is a mere four hours away in Louisville, Ky.
Communication and team-building are important in the game of lacrosse.
“I think it would bring more people together, because some people don’t know what lacrosse is,” Trent said. “It’s a great way to start a conversation and get involved on campus.”
Lacrosse originated as a Native American tradition, Trent said. Although it is not an Olympic sanctioned sport, it is becoming more popular on an international scale.
Trent’s career in lacrosse started when she was in 6th grade and continued throughout her high school career.
“I started thinking about starting a team last year, because as a senior in high school, I turned down college offers to play lacrosse,” Trent said. “I saw that Murray didn’t have a team, but I knew I still wanted to play.”
A typical lacrosse team consists of 20 to 30 players, while 11 players and a goalie play the field.
“It’s kind of set up like soccer,” Price said. “There is a frontline, mid-field and defense.”
Price and Trent hope to begin building the foundation for a program now so that it can be expanded upon later.
“I think in the future we would like to join a division,” Price said. “In the long run we would love for it to become an actual scholarship sport, but that is years down the road. It’s definitely going to be a lot of work to start, but I think it can be done.”
Equipment and funding for the sport are among the biggest challenges. Special equipment and goals are required. A lacrosse stick, protective gloves, protective goggles, mouth guards, and helmets are examples of some of the gear required.
“I’ve been doing more of the business side of it,” Price said. “We are going to try to hit fundraising pretty hard and contact local and national businesses to help. We’ve contacted the Curris Center and are going to file for an organization status, after that we will file for club team status.”
The team hopes to begin practicing this semester and begin playing full matches in the spring.
Price and Trent created a facebook group called Murray State Lacrosse and welcome everyone to join.
Story by Laura Kovarik, staff writer
Very cool! Thanks for writing this.