Entering overtime, the girls varsity lacrosse team sprinted across the field in hopes of victory against their rival, South Lakes High School, on April 5. Freshman attacker Gracie Miller was passed the ball as she ran down the field, taking a shot and scoring the winning goal. This allowed CHS to win 10-9. 

Maxpreps lists that the team had seven seniors leave after last season and they lost a starting defender out of 19 players. These losses left a hole on the team skill- and leadership-wise. 

“Because of the amount of players we lost this season, we started out rougher than last year, but I think once we clicked it got a lot better,” sophomore defender Meghan Sheehan said. “We have a lot of young talent, and I think if we keep strengthening the connection, we can start out next year really strong.”

At the end of this year, the team is only losing two seniors; Mary Powers and Amelia Hamby were two starting defenders. 

“These two seniors were extremely experienced and key players on the field, especially since they were starters,” Miller said. “Losing their leadership, skills and IQ will affect us tremendously next year but hopefully result in more underclassmen to step up next season.”

The majority of the team is young; there are six freshmen, three of which made second team all district, and four sophomores on the team. This allows the team more time to work on their connection, flow and overall game play throughout the next two years. 

“For having such a young and new team, I think we did a great job on working effectively together this season,” Miller said. “Many people stepped up and were able to help the team improve day by day. Although this was my first season playing for Chantilly, I think that we improved a lot from the previous years and from the beginning of the season, we were ranked fourth in the district which is higher than prior years.”

While the team showed development from last season, there are many tactical skills that the players think are necessary for them to improve. 

“This year, our team was best at running plays on offense,” junior captain midfielder Emerson Mustard said. “Stick work is something that can always be worked on and beneficial. I think we can also focus on our defense and being confident with the ball.”

According to Trine University, physical skills are not the only aspect of a sport that need to be improved on. They state that training to be tougher can prepare athletes to face adversity.

“Most games we came out really strong or ended the game really strong, but we never stayed consistent,” Miller said. “It felt like we all had a mental block stopping us from reaching our full potential.” 

The girls varsity lacrosse team had their last game against South Lakes High School on May 6 in the first round of playoffs. Chantilly lost 17-6. The team ended the season with a 5-6-3 record.