Northwestern will feel at home
Undated handout photo of Lacey Vigmostad (Northport), Northwestern University women's lacrosse player from Northport. Credit: S. J. Carrera, Inc.
The Northwestern women's lacrosse team is coming home for the NCAA Division I championship. That is what it will feel like for nine members of the Wildcats, who are expected to play before a large, partisan crowd at Stony Brook University Friday night.
In the national semifinals, Northwestern will meet North Carolina after defending champion Maryland faces Duke in the first game at 5 p.m.
"I'm going to have 25 people coming, at least,'' said Lacey Vigmostad, a junior defender who played at Northport. "I'm excited. There's nine of us and we're going to have a lot of support.''
Northwestern is two wins from reclaiming the national title, which had been in residence on the Evanston, Ill., campus for five straight seasons until Maryland beat the Wildcats last year. Northwestern had high hopes of going after Maryland's NCAA record of seven straight titles.
"Obviously, it was heartbreaking,'' junior goalie Brianne LoManto of Rocky Point said of the Maryland loss. "But it kind of made some of the younger players realize that you're not guaranteed to win anything.''
Northwestern isn't used to losing, and West Babylon's Shannon Smith said the team learned a lesson when it lost consecutive games during the regular season this year.
"It taught us a lot,'' she said. "We realized that we weren't where we needed to be.''
The players certainly want to return to the title game, but North Carolina, fueled by Garden City's Becky Lynch, could prove a significant obstacle.
"We never take anything for granted,'' Smith said. "Right now, we have one game left. That's all we're guaranteed.''
