#8- Practice begins

“Practice makes perfect,” is a saying we have all heard in our lifetime. Or perhaps, “practice makes permanent.” Both of these sayings are true and have been used to inspire teams and coaches and players everywhere. Practice is at the heart of life. It is what we put ourselves through to learn how to do something new, and the thing about practice is that it doesn't come in one sit down, it comes in several. Practice is at the heart of lacrosse, it is key! Without it there is no lacrosse. There is no teamwork, there is no skill, there is no plays or improvement made on the team. The thing I love most about practice is that it is a chance to mess up and learn around your team. It is where you can see what works together and personally and what doesn't. It is a beautiful thing. Practice isn't typically something that your knowledge can be expounded on because it is done so many different ways for different sports and coaching styles. But it is something that is a huge part of the game of lacrosse, so I feel like it is worth mentioning. Practice how you play. This is crucial! If we can learn to practice how we play, and play like we practice this can up our game and up our improvement. Practices are meant to be energetic and fast paced like a game would be, so when you get into those situations you know how to react. If practices are lazy, then the chances of you playing with skill and aggression in a game are low, and based on luck. Sometimes you don't even realize what kind of practice you need! In games the passes are faster, quicker and sometimes not right to you, so you have to have the agility and speed to be there and catch that. The list could go on and on of what specific things would be beneficial in practice and games, but the jist of it is learn as much as you can in practice, and mess up as many times as needed so in games the mistakes are less and the skill level is higher and you play better overall. My senior season of lacrosse started yesterday! The first practice of the season. Obviously not a practice without flaws. The whole team is rusty and out of shape. The first practice is one of my favorite times. This is the case because it is a chance for all of us to start new that season, with high aspirations and goals. We have optimism for the upcoming season!! We believe that we can take division 2 state! The coach believes in usIt is also a really good time for us to all see our flaws and work our hardest to get back into our groove of the game. For some of us it has been months since we have picked up a stick, and you would be surprised how after 2 or 3 hard practices it can come back like it is second nature. In our practices we go for a run around the field, then we do dynamic stretching and go right into our drills. We do passing shuttles, ground ball drills, and shooting drills. Because of the repetition of doing this every practice it helps us to really progress in it and the repetition drills it into your brain which creates that “second hand nature” feeling. Some of the plays that we run that are most beneficial to our team are out shooting drills. We feed the ball from the bottom of the goal into the offensive player with a defender on them. It turns into a one on one shooting opportunity to score. It teaches us to get open for the feed and dodge defenders to shoot. It also teaches us how to feed the ball correctly and defend someone in a one on one situation. Another drill we do is something called dog fights. It is when two girls are lined up side by side and someone rolls the ball forward and whoever can get to the ball first through a ground ball wins. This is so crucial in games because the ball is on the ground just as much as it is in the air, and if you can't get a ground ball you will not be a successful player or a successful team. It is equivalent to not being able to catch the ball, what kind of player would you be if you couldn't do that.