by Aaron Jaffe ’21

As much as this season’s Sherwood varsity lacrosse team wanted to be different from the teams of previous years, the 2019 Warriors did repeat a feat by the 2018 Warriors by becoming divisional champs once again. For Sherwood, their first six games and only meetings with their division foes all went smoothly, as expected. To open the season, the Warriors took down Blake 13-3 at home. Sherwood was dominant in the following stretch with wins against Magruder, Northwood, Springbrook, Blair and Paint Branch, outscoring their opponents 79-22.

However, the team and it’s players knew that the real challenge was still in front of them and it started with new rival, Damascus. From football to lacrosse, the bad blood still remained and with new added sparks this year. Last year, the hype Damascus versus Sherwood was real but the game went poorly for the Warriors as they were unable to keep up on their home turf. After spending his first three with Sherwood former defenseman for the Warriors, Jack Hanrahan is now playing his senior and first season with Damascus. All the pieces were set for a revenge story but away from home, Sherwood was again outlasted by Damascus 15-10. The score was not completely indicative of the game as after a very rough first quarter, Sherwood managed to make it competitive the rest of the way out.

Despite the loss, Sherwood still sits at 6-1 and knows they have to re-group rather fast if they want to salvage the season and go deep in the playoffs. Sophomore Charlie Matusek was with the team last year and knows that as bad as they wanted to win every game, they cannot think too much about any one singular game in the regular season. “We plan to rebound by playing really well against Wootton, and then have intense practices going into a very big game against BCC” said Matusek.

Along with Wootton and BCC, Sherwood will have last year’s state finalist Churchill on Friday. Sherwood has the talent and work ethic to get a win in any game they will play from here on out but this young team has to start proving themselves in the bigger games of the year.