New Trier knows that if it is to win its third consecutive PepsiCo Showdown, it is going to have to go through some tough teams en route to the big prize. Continue reading
Trevians Stay Undefeated
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Tag Archives: New Trier High School
Michigan Team Overwhelms New Trier
To say New Trier is the premier boys lacrosse team in the state of Illinois would be an understatement. The Trevians have won nine of the last 11 state titles, including the 2015 title.
New Trier Routs Palatine
Coming off of a nine-day layoff can be hard for any team, no matter how good they are. That was what New Trier was facing Saturday, March 26, having not played since March 17 due to Spring Break.
The Trevians started out slowly in the first half, but once they got going, everything was going in New Trier’s favor, as it rolled to a 5-0 win at Palatine.
“These girls have been traveling and not playing, so when we come back and play a well-coached, athletic, aggressive team, it’s hard to get into a rhythm, but we worked our way out of it,’’ New Trier coach Jim Burnside said. “For the past three seasons, they’ve scored the first goal against us on the season and they’re dangerous, so the girls had to grind it out.’’
“We always have a rough time coming back from Spring Break and when we came back this week it was snowing, so that made it harder to get back in the groove of things, but as the first half moved on, we started to click more and that’s when things started happening for us,’’ midfielder Celia Frei said.
New Trier had its first prime scoring chance in the 32nd minute, but was called offside, nullifying a potential goal. The Trevians wouldn’t manage another shot on goal for the next 10 minutes, but that all changed in the last 12 minutes of the first half.
Illinois-bound Kelly Maday got the Trevians on the board at the 11:13 mark when her shot hit the Palatine goalie and trickled into the net.
The Pirates had their best scoring chance with 9:53 remaining in the first half, but Sydney Parker chased down a Palatine forward as she was streaking toward the goal and knocked the ball away, keeping the score 1-0.
New Trier came into the game having outscored its opponents 13-0.
“What makes our defense great is our offense and what makes our offense great is our defense and both are linked by our midfielders,’’ Burnside said. “It’s about everybody being good at what they do so our defense can lock in and defend because our offense can attack. We’re still working though.’’
New Trier would score another goal thanks to Parker off of a corner kick with 2:25 remaining in the first half to go up 2-0 at halftime and essentially put the game away.
“When a team is being physical with us, we have to play our game and keep the ball on the ground because they were winning a lot of headballs,’’ Frei said. “At halftime we said we have to keep the ball on ground, keep moving fast and have them chase us.’’
The Trevians (4-0) carried all of the late first-half momentum into the second half and came out firing, scoring three goals in the first 10 minutes of the half.
First Avery Schuldt, who has committed to play at Dartmouth, tapped a ball in at the 34:00 mark. One minute later, Haley Yamada was taken down in the box and awarded a penalty shot, which Frei buried. Two-and-a-half minutes later, DePaul recruit Bina Saipi put the finishing touches on the scoring by taking a beautiful ball by Megan Murdoch and powering it past the Palatine goalie.
“This team is a bunch of veterans, they play together and what they’re able to do is make adjustments,’’ Burnside said. “I thought they made good adjustments to move the ball around and take advantage of restarts, just take a breath and know we can play.’’
Bucknell-bound goalie Dani Kaufman took care of the rest, saving every shot that came her way, finishing with three saves on the day.
The two-time defending state champion Trevians, who are ranked as the top team in the country by USA Today, have one nonconference game before conference play starts (April 7 at home against Niles North), as well as the start of one of the biggest tournaments in the country, the PepsiCo Showdown. New Trier has won the last two PepsiCo Showdowns.
New Trier shut out in opener
When two of the more successful softball programs in the area get together, one would expect a good game. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case Thursday afternoon when New Trier clashed with Fremd. Continue reading
Warriors pull upset
Maine West upsets New Trier in 10 innings for first sectional title
BY MICHAEL WOJTYCHIW June 2, 2012
Maine West didn’t need a lot of rest to pull off a school milestone.
The day after prom, many players on three hours sleep, the Warriors won their first sectional title in school history, defeating New Trier 4-2 in 10 innings Saturday morning at Niles West. Continue reading
New Trier grapplers take to the weights
New Trier captures Glenbrook South Regional title
BY Mike Wojtychiw February 6, 2012
Contributor
After ending the dual season last year at the Notre Dame Regional, New Trier knew that some things would have to change if the Trevians were going to resume winning regional crowns, as they had the previous three years. Continue reading
New Trier wins Regional with ease
New Trier cruises to regional championship
BY MICHAEL WOJTYCHIW February 4, 2012
For Sun-Times Media
MJ Pritchard knew that if New Trier was to continue its success, it couldn’t look past anyone and needed take Saturday’s Glenbrook South Regional match-by-match. Continue reading
>Lacrosse Catching on in Chicago, Suburbs
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A Glenbrook South player battles an opponent from Hathaway Brown for possession (Photo by Fred Dial)
In a sport dominated by schools on the East Coast, schools in the Midwest are starting to show that they are forces to be reckoned with. The sport of lacrosse has become so popular in the state of Illinois that the Illinois High School Association has approved a Lacrosse State Series starting in the 2010-2011 school year.
To do that, there needs to be a total of 60 boys and 40 girls teams by February of next year. Both the girls and boys have met those figures already and with the rapid growth of the sport, it is safe to say that the number of schools will only go up.
Lacrosse originated with the Native Americans of the United States and Canada, mainly among the Huron and Iroquois Tribes. In many societies/tribes, the ball sport was often part of religious ritual, played to resolve conflicts, heal the sick, develop strong, virile men and prepare for war. Legend tells of games with more than 100 players from different tribes taking turns to play.
It could be played on a field many miles in length and width; sometimes the game could last for days. Early lacrosse balls were made of deerskin, clay, stone and sometimes wood.
In the United States, lacrosse had primarily been a regional sport centered in and around Colorado, Florida, upstate New York, Texas, and mid-Atlantic states. In recent years, its popularity has started to spread south to Georgia, North Carolina, Alabama and Florida, as well as the Midwest. The sport has gained increasing visibility in the media, with a growth of college, high school, and youth programs throughout the country. According to a 2006 New York Times article, the NCAA Men’s Lacrosse Championship has the highest attendance of any NCAA Championship, outdrawing even the Final Four of men’s basketball.
The sport of boys lacrosse first originated in the state of Illinois in 1988, when the first title game was held between Lake Forest and Evanston High Schools, with Lake Forest winning. It has grown from a mere seven schools to over 60, including schools in the inner city, such as Harlan and Collins Academies.
New Trier High School and Loyola Academy have been the two most successful programs in boys lacrosse, having played in 13 and 17 of the 21 championship games, respectively. Loyola has won the most titles, winning eight of the 17, including five against the rival Trevians, but new Trier has had the ramblers’ number recently, as they have defeated Loyola in the title game in each of the past four years.
“The competitiveness of Illinois high school lacrosse has risen in recent years, said Jamie Considine, an Illinois High School Lacrosse Association administrator said. “We now have lots of players going on to play Division I, II, and III college lacrosse. We have expanded the number of All-Americans from one to six annually to account for the increase in numbers and talent.”
Girls lacrosse, while not as popular yet in Illinois as the boys game, is only entering its 12th year of competition in the state of Illinois. Seven schools first started the Illinois High School Women’s Lacrosse Association in 1998: Loyola, New Trier, Regina Dominican, Lane Tech, Glenbrook South and Lake Forest.
Like their male counterparts, Loyola and New Trier, along with Lake Forest, have been the most successful teams, with Loyola being in every single of the 12 championship games.
“We are all excited because I feel this will give lacrosse more of a seal of approval,” said Loyola girls lacrosse coach John Dwyer. “Because it will now be an IHSA sport, more schools will start programs and that only makes the level of play in Illinois better.”
With the new Championship Series, there will be a new quirk in the seeding that there wasn’t before. The boys game has two divisions, A and B, where the top teams are in the A division and the rest are in the B division.
With the inception of the new playoff series, this will no longer be the case. All schools will play in one class. The girls game, however, does not have multiple classes and is seeded. The Championship Series will do what they do with the rest of their sports: break schools up into regionals and sectionals, based on location. Not all coaches are thrilled about this.
“I have a bad feeling that the Championship games won’t feature the best two teams in the state anymore,” said Dwyer, who has been Loyola’s coach for eight years. “In the past it had been that we would face New Trier or Lake Forest in either the semifinals or finals. With this new system, we will face them in the second or third round. So it might end up that the best team in the state is done after one or two games.”
But as Dwyer later added, it doesn’t matter what the name on the trophy is, it’s all the same. You can never take away the feeling of a championship.
Michael Wojtychiw 