Pressure? What Pressure? Wagner Unfazed
by Brian Delaney | Special to Lacrosse Magazine Online
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| Sacred Heart goalie Chelsea Wagner leads Division I in save percentage and has the Pioneers eying a third straight Northeast Conference championship. |
Chelsea Wagner got involved with the goalie position the way so
many others have before her.
“Nobody else wanted to play it,” said Wagner, who
hails from Aurora, Colo., and started playing lacrosse in eighth
grade when her mother, Cynthia, started a feeder program.
When longtime Sacred Heart coach Laura Cook saw Wagner’s
highlight tape, she saw a potential impact player in the Northeast
Conference.
“I remember it was late in the process,” Cook said.
“I believe we heard word-of-mouth that she was still
available. We got the highlight film but got it in early April or
late March. I remember watching at home one night, and immediately
liked that she was 5-10. That’s a good attribute to
have.”
Wagner also had good reaction time, judgment and was an
accomplished clearer of the ball.
She found Sacred Heart to be a good fit.
“It was a lucky move for us,” Cook said.
That’s because the Pioneers are 11-4 on the season and 8-0
in the NEC, tied atop the conference standings with Quinnipiac
(9-4, 8-0).
Wagner ranks No. 1 in Division I in save percentage (.593), and
also ranks in the top 10 nationally in goals against average
(8.08), saves (134) and saves per game (11.0).
In recent wins over Mount St. Mary’s and Monmouth, by scores
of 9-7 (OT) and 8-5, respectively, Wagner totaled 24 saves. She
stopped six free position attempts in the Monmouth victory and was
named the WomensLacrosse.com Division I Defensive Player of the
Week on April 6. The honor was the first for a Sacred Heart
Pioneer.
“I don’t really feel like I let pressure get to me to
the point where I’m not going to have fun,” she said.
Cook said Wagner returned for her senior season in better shape, and her footwork has improved. The 11th-year head coach also said her goalie can play anywhere in the country.
“It’s nice also to have a lefty goalie because that switches up the shooters a lot,” Cook said. “It gets them confused when they have to shoot at a lefty goalie. I think she’s a game-changer, and I think it’s tough for people not to be worried about her when they come play us.”
Sacred Heart hosts Quinnipiac on Saturday to end the regular season, before the NEC tournament -- to be hosted by the top seed -- decides the NCAA automatic berth.
The Pioneers have won two straight NEC championships, but lost in both NCAA tournament play-in games they’ve competed in. Last year, Fairfield knocked out Cook’s club by a 16-10 score.
Wagner, who plans to get her masters in education from Sacred Heart after graduation this spring, said the Pioneers play with great chemistry.
“Our identity, we are all one,” she said. “I feel like, the best way to explain it is, we’re a very cohesive unit. We have our ups and downs, we make our mistakes, but we just work so well as a team. That’s one of the most important ways to be successful.”
And if any mistakes are made on the field, Wagner is usually there to clean them up.
She’s happy to do it.
News & Notes
Monmouth (7-8, 5-2) and Mount St. Mary’s (6-8, 4-3) are sitting in third and fourth place currently, with Robert Morris (5-8, 3-4) eyeing a spot in the conference tournament… Bryant sophomore goalie Lauren Filippone made 17 saves, matching a career high, in a 13-3 loss to Mount St. Mary’s on April 11. She had seven ground balls in the defeat… Sophomore Kate Simmons has 36 goals and 13 assists for St. Francis this season. She also has a team-high 54 draw controls… In the Big East Conference, four teams have one or no losses in the standings: Georgetown (7-5, 5-0), Notre Dame (8-4, 4-1), Loyola (9-4, 3-1) and Syracuse (7-4, 2-1). The Orange hosts Loyola on Friday and Villanova on Sunday. Syracuse and Georgetown meet in the regular season finale on May 1 at the Carrier Dome.
