Longwood University Athletics

By CHRIS COOK
LongwoodLancers.com

In its natural state, iron is not easy manipulated. It takes extreme heat, strength and unrelenting persistence. The process is brutal, dangerous and difficult, but the end result is a transformation unachievable by any other means.
 
The process that has forged Longwood lacrosse into the surprise of the Big South this spring has been just as raw and uncomfortable, but the transformation has been equally dramatic. Led by Big South Coach of the Year Elaine Jones and a wealth of battle-hardened underclassmen, the No. 2 seed Lancers enter this weekend's Big South Championship tournament on a five-game win streak and stand as perhaps the most dangerous team in the four-team bracket.
 
But the team that Longwood has become is a far cry from what it once was. Throughout a spirit-breaking first half of the season, they suffered blowouts, and they suffered heartbreakers. They ran up big leads, and they lost them just as easily. They lost to four straight Commonwealth rivals, and nearing the end of March, the once-hopeful Lancers were limping to the end of their non-conference schedule with a 2-7 record.
 
However, it was the burn of those defeats that provided the catalyst that made Longwood's transformation possible. All of those losses were unique, but they shared many common threads: Longwood was constantly plagued by turnovers, missed offensive opportunities, poor on-field communication, and a general lack of execution.
 
Those deficiencies were symptoms of a young team with a core of newly appointed leaders trying to find their footing. After graduating an impactful class of seven seniors the year prior, the Lancers entered the fall with just one senior on the roster and a talented class of juniors who had yet to be given any meaningful leadership responsibilities in their first two years in the program.
 
But what Longwood lacked in cohesiveness on the field, they made up for with chemistry off of it and an uncommonly universal drive to succeed. The most nagging element for the Lancers during that wayward first half of 2019 had nothing to do with Xs and Os and everything to do with the fact that they simply weren't performing at the level they knew they could.
 
"We had a lot of challenges," said junior Kaitlin Luccarelli, who has emerged from Longwood's early struggles to lead the Big South in goals and earn All-Big South first team honors. "We had to communicate more on and off the field. The juniors had to lead more through how we work and how we present ourselves in our work ethic. In general, we had to be more of leaders and hold each other accountable."
 
Dissatisfied with their performance, the Lancers examined each loss and turned the poor start into fuel for their fire. With guidance from head coach Elaine Jones and assistant Jenna Kasmarik, they learned where they had been exposed and set about shoring up those areas.
 
"Saint Francis taught us a lot about going down and having the mental toughness to come back from a deficit like that," Jones said. "Then the Old Dominion game taught us that even though we have a lead, it can slip through our fingers if we don't take care of the little things and pay attention the details. We learned because that was a tough stretch.

"The losing built our character. It made us stronger in areas where, frankly, we were weak."
 
As disheartening as they were, those early-season struggles created a powder keg of frustrations and what-ifs. The Lancers just needed a spark to set it off.
 
One week later, their worst loss of the season lit the fuse.
 
Longwood ended the non-conference portion of its schedule with a 15-8 win over East Carolina, a much-needed sign that the spark Longwood had been working for had caught. However, one week later at the start of Big South play, conference preseason favorite High Point dowsed the embers of that smoldering fire by dealing Longwood a 22-3 defeat.
 
Dowsed, but not extinguished.

"We came to practice Monday after High Point, and I said we have three things for you guys," Jones said. "Number one, we're going to have a short-term memory for our losses. Two, we're going to work to improve our strengths and what we do well. And third, we're going to practice and play with enthusiasm and excitement."
 
Those words from Jones kept the fire burning and set the tone for the breakout to come. The following Saturday, Longwood bounced back to defeat Big South rival Radford 16-15. It was a gut-check win that saw the Lancers squander a two-goal lead but rally in the final six minutes to pull it out.
 
They followed four days later with another one-goal win, this time on the road against Gardner-Webb. That game featured a comeback from a seven-goal deficit and a dominant 8-1 run over the final 26 minutes that ended with a 13-12 victory.
 
The Lancers had risen from that High Point loss to move to 2-1 in the Big South. The embers of Longwood's comeback had begun to glow again, and soon after they caught fire.
 
Longwood sent a statement to the rest of the league with their third straight win, a 14-4 blowout of perennial Big South power Winthrop. A 13-10 takedown of preseason No. 2 Campbell followed, and the Lancers ended the year with another rout over Presbyterian.
 
And in a poetic bookend to the season, that win over the Blue Hose came by a score of 22-9 – the same score by which the Lancers lost to Duquesne in the season opener.
 
"We've just come so far. I don't know how else to say it," Jones said. "It's amazing to watch our team now and see how much they get it. They're watching film, they're asking how they can be better, what they can do. Our level of commitment to improving our lax IQ off the field, and having that translate on the field has been a huge part of our success.
 
"It's been a process, don't get me wrong, but by now they've proven themselves to be dedicated to doing the little things that make a difference."
 
Those little things have shown up in a big way. After averaging just 9.8 goals per game and giving up an average of 12.9 per game in those first nine outings, the Lancers have outscored their past seven opponents by an average of 5.2 goals per game. They've held two of the conference's top teams to single digits during that span, and they ended the regular season with a season-best 22 goals at Presbyterian.
 
"I can't tell you the last time we've had a bad practice," Jones said. "We take time to joke around and have fun, but we still get stuff done. We haven't had any wasted practices. That wasn't the case early in the year, and it's a credit to our team in how they responded to those losses.
 
"That's not an easy thing for a young team or any team, to keep working and trying to improve when there are games you felt like you should have won but that slipped away. Our team recognized the little things and the few mistakes that caused those losses, and they fixed them. Mistakes we've pointed out on film are mistakes they haven't made again. That's character, and that's grit, and it's toughness, and that's the identity of this team."
 
Now on the day of the Big South semifinals, the Lancers are ablaze. They enter Friday night's rematch against No. 3 seed Winthrop winners of six of their past seven games. They've won blowouts, and they've won gut-checks. They've rallied from deficits, and they've held off comebacks. Since that High Point loss, they've beaten every Big South team they've faced.
 
"Even after we lost to High Point, we had the goal of being the No. 2 seed in the conference," Howard said. "After that game, we said in the locker room the next time we see them would be in the Big South Championship. We've kept that mindset."
 
Fueled by that drive and vision for themselves, the Lancers have endured a forging by fire. What was once a raw, unmolded block of iron has been transformed into a razor-thin spearhead that has sliced through the Big South one opponent at a time.
 
It's a run that's proven to the rest of the Big South that Longwood belongs, but more importantly, it's proven that same thing to the Lancers themselves.
 
 
#GoWood