In my sign-off last week, I made a prediction and a suggestion: I said Matt Kemp would hit his league-leading 15th home run on Mother's Day, and I urged you all to make sure your moms had a card from you to read while they watched him do it.
My foresight was quickly compromised when Josh Hamilton took the major league home run lead with a four-homer binge last Tuesday night. To add insult to injury, Kemp exited Sunday's game early with a tight hamstring and a likely ticket to the disabled list. Consequently, I think I'm going to take a break from calling the shots for the foreseeable future.
While I may be giving up on my psychic sports abilities for now, I want to keep up with the trend I started last week and give a shout out to the Dartmouth women's lacrosse team, who, like Kemp, ran into some trouble on Mother's Day.
Big Green women's lacrosse saw its season end on Sunday, losing in the first round of the NCAA Tournament to the No. 4 Syracuse University. While the loss was disappointing, it did not alter the fact that the team had an incredible year that included the program's first Ivy League Tournament title. Getting into the postseason also meant that the women's lacrosse squad was one of the last Dartmouth teams competing as the spring season for sports was winding down.
Last Monday, as I was waiting for treatment on my busted left ankle, I asked our equipment manager if he had seen the trainer around the facilities. His response was, "He is probably just running a little late. The only team that is really still playing right now is women's lax, and they have their own trainers."
Before I came to Dartmouth, if you said the word "lax" to me, my mind would probably have jumped to the tune of Miley Cyrus' "Party in the USA," you know, "I hopped off the plane at L.A.X." ... and so on. Basically, that abbreviation meant nothing to me. Yes, my school had a lacrosse team, but it was only for males, and the kids who tended to play were often categorized as the kids who couldn't make varsity in basketball, football or baseball.
One of my good friends was actually on the team, but he was strictly a defensive midfielder, which meant he was the Bill Romanowski of the team the enforcer (the coach didn't even try to teach him how to cradle the ball). He claimed the only reason he played was to stay in shape for football. Oh, and he had a buzz cut. I don't think he even knew the meaning of helmet flow.
After being at Dartmouth for three years, it's safe to say I knew what my equipment manager was talking about when he mentioned the word "lax" last Monday. That's not to say there weren't some growing pains with getting accustomed to lax's popularity on the East Coast. Coming from Los Angeles, I never felt as if I were missing out on anything by not being involved in the sport. Here, though, it has a following and its own unique culture. I would be lying to you if I claimed I don't own a few lax pinnies myself or that I won't get excited when I hear "Midd Kid" in the basement this Green Key weekend. More importantly, the athletes have talent, and the sport itself has extreme historical significance.
Like my perspective regarding lacrosse has shifted during my stint at Dartmouth thus far, I believe this column has experienced a similar evolution. If you would have told me when I first started writing at the beginning of the term that I would write a column about women's lax instead of my predictions for the rest of the NBA playoffs, I would have told you that you were crazy. Originally, I wanted to use this platform to discuss national sports headlines, which I did in my first few segments, like Harvard's top-100 basketball recruit, Frank McCourt and Peyton Manning.
But what I have come to realize is that you guys can get those takes on Grantland or SI.com. Dartmouth is very unique, and while there may not be excitement occurring in the sports world on campus every week, there is always a way to take national headlines and put them into Dartmouth terminology. So, with only two more opportunities to write for the remainder of the spring, I want to thank you guys in advance for joining me on this ride. Survive Green Key, and come get stranded on the Island again next week.
