Thursday was the final game of the season for Bryn Mawr Baldwin School (Pa.) as it faced Merion Episcopal Academy (Pa.). Baldwin lost 23-11 to the Churchwomen, but it also marked one of the final times this season you’re going to see one of the next great American female lacrosse players.
Sloan Warren has done what not very many have ever done in the history of the National Federation of State High School Associations: score 100 goals in a girls’ high school lacrosse season.
The kicker: she’s a freshman.
The second kicker: every goal she has scored thus far has been on the road.
OK, so your jaws are already on the floor, so let’s give some perspective to what has been going on.
Warren has been playing varsity lacrosse for three years. She can, since the Inter-Ac Conference — the oldest scholastic league in the country — is not part of the Pennsylvania Interscholastic Athletic Association. She’s been playing the sport since fourth grade, and has developed a game sense that has not been seen in some time in the greater Philadelphia area.
Her total goal output this year is 126 — one of the highest recorded totals ever. But it’s easy to dismiss a 100-goal scorer from a small school if a team has a great denial defense or has the players trained enough to ride the ball in the midfield to prevent the opposition from even setting up in the attack end. It may also be enough to say that a player like Warren only scores goals. However, she led the team in draw controls, ground-ball pickups, and total points.
It may be easy to dismiss Warren’s current assault on the National Federation record book, since the records held therein are extremely scanty. The Federation’s 2008 record book lists former Rutgers attacker Amanda Mazzarella from Bay Shore (N.Y.) with 118 goals as the current record.
But the New York State Public High Schools Athletic Association website lists Shannon Smith of West Babylon (N.Y.) with 129 goals in 2006. Smith will be playing next year for Northwestern.
Yep, that 129-goal season was her sophomore year. She followed up that season with 122 goals in her junior year, and had 70 goals heading into late April before an ankle sprain sidelined her.
It’s hard to say how well Warren or Smith are going to turn out; much can happen between receiving all of those high-school accolades and the first day of fall ball in freshman year.
But this is an interesting era of lacrosse from the grass roots all the way to the elite collegiate levels. Players have developed their skills thanks to titanium and carbon-fiber stick shafts and offset molded heads. Defenders can no longer use their sticks to the exact same effect as before.
As a result, you are finding amazing players coming through the American pipeline like Smith, Warren, Casey Ancarrow, Erin Brennan, and Julie Gardner. And collegiate records set by the immortal Jen Adams are being approached by Syracuse junior attacker Katie Rowan.
It’ll be fun to see how these student-athletes develop.
