Boys’ Lacrosse: Team loses key seniors, has hopeful future

The boys’ lacrosse team played its last game on May 4, losing to Los Gatos 9-6 and ending a difficult season after which the team will say goodbye to 13 seniors.

The team finished with an overall record of 4-11 (1-10 in the De Anza league). Because the team was composed mostly of seniors this year, the roster will look very different next season, according to freshman attackman Clark Rothenberg. Rothenberg said that while he thinks the team took a step forward this year, it will miss its seniors, especially goalie Gavin Peake.

“We’re losing a lot of key seniors, including [Peake],” Rothenberg said. “As a team, we did not do great. I think we improved, but we still could have done a lot better.”

Peake agreed that the team’s record could have and should have been better. However, he said that the team was more in sync this year than in previous years, which helped the entire team improve.

“I think we improved in our teamwork,” Peake said. “Instead of having one or two really good players, all of our players were about equally good and helped each other out.”

Junior Eric Van Noorden said that while he enjoyed the season, the team underperformed. Along with Peake and Rothenberg, Van Noorden considered beating Los Gatos 10-4 on March 23 to be the highlight of the season.

“It was a fun season, but we didn’t meet our expectations very well,” Van Noorden said. “Our expectations were to go to the playoffs and beat LG twice, but we only beat them once. We didn’t finish with a very strong record.”

Next season and beyond, Van Noorden believes that strong leadership will be the key to the team’s success.

“Our team definitely needs captains because we were fooling around a little bit too much,” Van Noorden said. “I want to be a better leader next year and help out the team more.”

While it will be difficult to rebound from the loss of its key seniors, Rothenberg still has faith going forward in the now much younger team. He believes the team will make the CCS playoffs next year, as they will be moving down to the less competitive El Camino league.

“I expect us to make the CCS and do well in the playoffs,” Rothenberg said.

Next year’s key players will include Rothenberg, sophomore attackman Pablo Parker, and junior mid-fielders Nicholas Doyen and Van Noorden.