Quarterfinal Coaches Balance Games, Exams
by Jac Coyne |
Lacrosse Magazine Online Staff | Coyne Archive
| Twitter
|
| Brian Krol (above) and Cortland are in the middle of
their exam period, but their opponent on Wednesday, RIT, is in the
same boat. © Darl Zehr Photography |
By scheduling their quarterfinal game for 7:30 p.m. start,
it appears that Jim Berkman and the Salisbury men’s
lacrosse team want to have a packed house for the Sea
Gulls clash with Haverford on Wednesday night.
Why else would you play an evening game, right?
Actually, the decision to move the game to prime time was out of
simple necessity. One of the issues that gets lost in
the excitement of the NCAA Division III tournament
season is a lot of schools are dealing with academic
commitments.
“We’re in the middle of exams right now and
that’s why we’re playing Wednesday night,” said
Berkman, who has to deal with this issue just about every year.
“Because we’ll only be in conflict with one exam period
instead of four of them – there is an exam period at 7 p.m.,
as well – we went later.”
It’s been a stressful week for Berkman as he tries to juggle
the practice schedule to allow his players to satisfy their
academic concerns while also getting the team ready for a couple of
big games.
It started when weather pushed the start of the school's exam
period back a day, forcing several of Berkman’s players to
take tests last Saturday. Thus the 7 p.m. start against
Springfield.
It has continued this week, with Mike Winters – he of the six
goals against Springfield – missing half of Monday
night’s 8 p.m. practice because he had an exam that began at
7 p.m.
Dealing with the academic rigors at this time of year is a fact of
life for Salisbury, and Berkman is not exactly sure how he
feels about it.
“I think it’s a Catch-22,” he said.
“It’s kind of cool when the kids don’t have
anything, but sometimes when the kids have too much time on their
hands that can be no good, as well.”
The delicate balancing act around exam time is by no means only a
Salisbury issue. With four straight trips to the championship game
for Cortland, head coach Steve Beville has been trying to
streamline the exam obligations of his players, which typically
fall near the quarterfinal round.
“It’s pretty tough,” said Beville.
“You’re committed to making sure they’re taking
care of business in the classroom. Ultimately, they’re in
college to get a degree, so we want to make sure that they are
doing well academically. We try to do the best we can with
attendance at practice and we try to move the practices to find the
times when we have the least guys missing.”
In addition to altering the practice routine, coaches must keep in
mind that there is a lot going on in the minds of the players, so
it’s best not overload their brains.
“You have to limit the amount of time you use on film and
game-planning because you don’t want to overdo it,”
said Beville. “You have to be sensitive to the fact that they
have to run off and do some studying for their finals. It’s
something playoff teams go through and it’s a balancing act
– the commitment to lacrosse and that the boys are getting
enough time with the books, as well.”
For most of the coaches playing on Wednesday, the biggest issue
during the exam period is just having enough players available to
have a good practice.
Stevenson coach Paul Cantabene was one of the fortunate coaches
because his exams ended last week. Still, the daily routine was
impacted.
“It’s a little tough, but we tried to get all the exam
schedules a week before so we could plan practice,” said
Cantabene. “There was one practice where we had barely half
the team out there, but that’s kind of always going to be
there. Fortunately, we had the bye in the first round.”
Middlebury, which had its exam period end Tuesday morning, has been
tip-toeing around academic commitments for a week now, meaning
there aren’t a whole lot of 10-on-10 scrimmages.
“We have exams from 2-5 p.m. and 7-10 p.m., so we just try to
squeeze a quick practice in between,” said Middlebury coach
Dave Campbell. “Some guys have to run off early for the late
exam and some guys are coming in late because the earlier exam ran
over. It is a tough time of year scheduling-wise, but that’s
what you deal with.”
Roanoke coach Bill Pilat doesn’t have to deal with exams
– the Maroons have already had graduation – but the
school has something called May Term. It’s a month-long
intensive study session that every student must participate in once
before they graduate. The students take one class, which meets from
9-11 a.m. and from 1-4 p.m every day.
Most of the Roanoke players fulfill the commitment during their
junior years, meaning when Pilat gets into the postseason it
becomes a real factor.
“The more success that we have, the more of a headache it
becomes,” said Pilat. “We’re actually having some
problems trying to get some guys out for the game on Wednesday
[against Stevenson]. They have to go on a field trip to a D-Day
Memorial before we can leave on Tuesday.”
Cortland’s Beville feels a little bit better about his
academic situation because he knows his quarterfinal opponent, RIT,
is going through the same issues.
“Both of us are in knee deep in finals,” said Beville.
“We’re going to be feeling the pressures of taking
finals all through this whole week, same as them. It’s kind
of nice that no one is going be dealing with it and the other
isn’t. No one is going to have an advantage in that
sense.”
That won’t be the case when Tufts, which finished its exam
week last Friday, hosts Middlebury and Stevenson entertains
Roanoke, but that’s just the way the schedule works out
sometimes.
And it sure beats the alternative.
“Fortunately, we’ve had to deal with it every year
since I’ve been here,” said Campbell.
