Lambrecht: Cloud Envelops Virginia Lacrosse
by Gary Lambrecht | Special to Lacrosse Magazine Online | Lambrecht Archive
* UVA Lax Player Dead; Another in Custody
* UVA: Huguely-Love Dispute; Teams to Play
* Statement: Virginia Lacrosse Teams will Continue
Seasons
Five days before the NCAA Division I men’s lacrosse
tournament field is unveiled, I would rather be immersed in the fun
and games of bracketology and the scientific calculations of
quality wins, bad losses, RPI and strength of schedule.
I would rather examine how Johns Hopkins could beat Loyola on
Saturday and barely qualify for its 39th consecutive postseason. I
would rather speculate how Stony Brook will come out of nowhere to
make a run to the final four. I would prefer to handicap
Maryland’s chances to win its first NCAA title in 35 years,
or guess whether the crazily competitive Ivy League will send three
schools to the dance and ruin things for a school such as Loyola or
Hopkins or Georgetown.
And yet, with the terrible, tragic news that has come out of the
lacrosse family at the University of Virginia -- home of one of the
nation’s premier schools and elite lacrosse programs -- I
find myself not caring much about the makeup of the 16-team
bracket.
Since the news broke in Charlottesville on Monday that men’s
lacrosse player George Huguely had been charged with first-degree
murder in the death of women’s lacrosse player Yeardley Love,
I haven’t given much thought to such trivialities as which
teams will secure the last few at-large bids that are up for
grabs.
Since a 22-year-old man was charged with killing a 22-year-old
woman, leaving two families crushed and a campus in a state of
disbelief, I haven’t fixated in the least on such mundane
questions as who will keep Syracuse from winning its third
consecutive NCAA men’s crown.
Real life and death once again have knocked fun and games into
their place. Real life and death once again have brought a cloud
back to Virginia, where coach Dom Starsia’s men’s team
keeps getting smacked by fate’s cruel, random hand.
There was the death by apparent suicide in November 2008 of former
team captain Will Barrow at age 22. Nearly 10 months ago, Mike
Colley, the longtime assistant director of media relations and main
lacrosse contact at Virginia -- a man as funny and charming as he
was great at his job -- died of a heart attack at 46.
And now the Cavaliers, led by one of the classiest coaches in
college sports in Starsia, are left to deal with another horrible
wound. They are left to face and contemplate the suspected death of
one of their own by the hand of one of their own.
The men’s team, on which Huguely played as a second-line
midfielder, is the best squad I’ve seen this year. The
Cavaliers, tough-minded on defense and loaded with speed, good
shooters and unselfishness on offense, are top-ranked and expected
to draw the tournament’s top seed. Virginia will be favored
to win the school’s first national championship since
2006.
The sports writer and fan in me hopes that both Virginia lacrosse
teams go far into their respective NCAA tournaments. The father in
me keeps thinking about bigger things.
Yesterday, as I drove to pick up my first-grade son from school, I
passed through Love’s hometown of Cockeysville, Md. I
wondered where she used to live and how her parents and family
could come to grips with such an awful loss. This morning, after
putting my son on the school bus, exchanging waves and smiles with
him, then watching him drive off, I started counting the hours
until I would see him again.
Such are the moments when fun and games mean so little.
