“Westborough Youth Lacrosse Plays Ice Bowl Season Opener”
WESTBOROUGH
Sunday, April 6, 2003Written by Diane and George Lane
With spring on hold and Westborough athletic fields closed, the Westborough Youth Lacrosse Association (WYLA) cancelled their three league games on Sunday, April 6 at the Hastings School. A scrimmage between the two U11 teams was also cancelled. In spite of this, WYLA’s U13 boys could be found playing a game at 8 AM Sunday on the new artificial grass, 9-11 Memorial Field in Southborough. “With some scrambling we were able to eek out an early hour and a half time slot; enough time for only one game”, stated George Lane, WYLA President. So it was arranged to have 2 U13 teams in the WYLA program to play each other in a game. A ref was scheduled and all were told to dress very warmly. When everyone arrived, the field was completely white with a quarter inch of frozen ice to accompany the windy 30 degree weather. With the players showing up with cleats as instructed for this new technology field, the ice broke up easily when walked or run on. Only a dark colored ball had to be found for the game to commence (white is the official ball color). A green colored ball was volunteered, coaches placed the cones to mark the field corners and out-of-bounds lines and cleared ice from the mid-line and goalie crease lines. Parents either huddled around their coffee or huddled in their cars which were strategically parked to view the game from these warm pods.
The teams lined up for the face-off and the ref blew his whistle to start the 2003 season. For about a dozen of the players this was also the start of the very first lacrosse game they played in. The score was close with teams trading goals back and forth until it was tied at 8-8 at the end of the end of the third quarter. Then one team pulled out in front a bit and won 11-8. For a first game and the first time outside, the kids looked very good. The new kids jumped right into the flow and the experienced kids, many of whom are 6th and 7th graders playing in their third year of youth lacrosse, showed good passing, shooting and defensive skills.
Although a little on the cold side, a lot of fun was had. There wasn’t much slipping, but when a player scooped up a loose ball on the ground they sometimes got a lacrosse stick full of frost chips at well; then they got to learn a new skill in flipping the ball up brief, quickly dumping the frost pieces and catching the ball again.
“Now that was a fun time”, stated Kevin O’Connor, Co-Head Coach for the U13-1 team, current graduate student at UConn and previous lacrosse coach at Bedford High School for four years.
“It certainly beats practice in a gym”, added Rick Grant, Head Coach of the U13-2 team, Vice President in the lacrosse program, President of Westborough Pop Warner Football and a youth basketball coach.
Oh What a Field
Even in these conditions, the field was soft. Unlike the old artificial turf fields which were thin carpet-like material over a cement surface, where sneakers were won. Lane commented, “I definitely have field envy. These new artificial grass fields are porous to handling rain and melting snow; have a thick layer of tiny rubber pellets for a cushioned grass feel which makes running on it and falling on it very nice. We were able to play even with the wet and cold weather we have been having, …and no one minded that we played on the field. We played today without any worry of damaging a field.” This is the same field technology that the Westborough “Turf’s Up Project” is trying to raise money for and get installed at the Westborough High School (see www.turfs-up.org for additional information).
