Katie Schwarzmann
As the Northwestern Wildcats celebrated their eighth consecutive National Championship bid at Kenneth P. LaValle Stadium in May, the Terrapins women’s lacrosse team locker room was harboring the opposite emotions right across the hall.
Coach Cathy Reese’s squad was dealing with the harsh reality of the night’s preceding events: For the second year in a row, the Terps had fallen to the Wildcats in the final four. Though 2011’s defeat took place in the National Championship game, this year’s defeat stung just as harshly.
“It was really quiet in the locker room,” midfielder Katie Schwarzmann said. “We wanted to win the big one, but at the end of the day we came up just short.”
Schwarzmann — the 2012 Tewaaraton Award winner for the best player in women’s lacrosse — is determined to make sure her team gets over the hump this season, and that journey starts in their season opener Sunday at Richmond.
“We don’t want any regrets this year,” Schwarzmann said. “We want to reach our ultimate goal.”
Schwarzmann, along with fellow captains attacker Alex Aust and defender Melissa Diepold, hopes to instill a sense of accountability in this year’s Terps. After coming up short two years in a row, the trio wants to ensure their teammates offer the same attention to detail and focus that they do.
It will start on the offensive end, an area on the field where the team ranked No. 1 in the ACC last season. The unit will have to deal with the loss of attacker Karri Ellen Johnson, but Schwarzmann and Aust, a senior — who combined for 116 goals and 74 assists last season — should provide more than enough to replicate Johnson’s production.
“We all have the mentality that we have some unfinished business,” Aust said after the Terps’ 19-8 exhibition drubbing of the Japanese national team on Feb. 1.
The Terps also have some holes to fill on defense. While they return Diepold and All-American defender Iliana Sanza, they’ll have to replace graduated goalkeeper Brittany Dipper in the cage, a task that will fall on either senior Kasey Howard or redshirt sophomore Abbey Clipp.
“We are going to work together,” Sanza said. “We will do what our coaches ask and be there for each other.”
The addition of another talented recruiting class should help them do that. Defender Alice Mercer, midfielder Taylor Cummings and attacker Halle Majorana will all look to make their impact on the veteran-laden Terps squad, and Reese hopes the mix will prove to be a winning formula.
“We have a great history of playing a number of freshmen and having them step up,” Reese said. “We expect no different with this class.”
Just three seasons ago, a Terps team packed with noteworthy freshmen Schwarzmann, Aust, Sanza and Diepold rode a dominating 22-1 record to a National Championship victory over Northwestern. After consecutive losses on the game’s final weekend in the past two seasons, the now-senior crew would love nothing more than to go out just the way they came in.
“We are ready to go,” Diepold said. “We’ve got to beat the best to be the best.”
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