Injuries take toll on men’s lacrosse, Ryan Polley avoids excuses

It’s been a challenging time for the Boston University men’s lacrosse team as of late, as the team lost its last four games and missed the Patriot League Tournament.

Part of the blame for the Terriers’ (8-6, 3-5 Patriot League) cold streak has been injuries. Freshman midfielder Brendan Homire and junior faceoff specialist Sam Talkow both picked up injuries in the season’s final weeks. As a result, the two starters sat out during BU’s 13-12 loss to No. 11 Loyola University Maryland and were less than 100 percent in the 11-7 loss against College of the Holy Cross.

Despite his team struggling to stay healthy as the year progressed, BU head coach Ryan Polley doesn’t want to make excuses for his team’s recent form.

“Every team is banged up, and, like a lot of other teams, we had some key guys hurting and couldn’t practice,” Polley said. “But the bottom line is, we didn’t play very well against Holy Cross, and we have plenty of great players out there. There is certainly no reason why we couldn’t have played a better game against Holy Cross. We just didn’t execute.”

Freshman class shows promise

Highly touted upon arriving on Commonwealth Avenue, the Terriers’ freshman class enjoyed a prominent role throughout the 2016 season.

Specifically, Homire and attack James Burr are respectively fourth and second in total points. Long stick midfielder Drew Lukacs and defenseman Quintin Germain also had strong first seasons.

“We’re happy with the class, and certainly there are some guys at the forefront that have played and gotten a lot of minutes and been productive,” Polley said. “But there’s also some guys that have shown flashes in [midfielder Michael] Laviano and [midfielder] Tristan Ruh, and then some guys that are definitely going to play for us down the road like [midfielder] Thomas Schmidt and [defenseman] Chris Lappin that have been practicing really well.”

Seniors leave mark on program

While the freshman class is just kicking off its collegiate career, four Terriers will graduate in a few weeks.

Faceoff specialist Elliott Burr and midfielders Alex Paroda, Sam Tenney and Patrick Donnelly will move on from BU lacrosse next year. The quartet combined to play in 30 games this season and will be missed in 2017 as the Terriers attempt to improve on an up-and-down campaign.

“All four of them are transfers, so they came from other programs and wanted to be a part of something new, and they’ve done a good job with their play on the field and their leadership at times,” Polley said. “We’ll certainly miss those guys in those two regards.”

One last measuring stick awaits

Although the Terriers will sit out the conference tournament for the third-straight year, there is still more lacrosse to be played. BU will host No. 14 Duke University on May 8 for its final game of the season.

With 16 days in between the Holy Cross (4-11, 3-5 Patriot League) loss and the Duke (9-6) matchup, Polley said the Terriers must remain focused and concentrate in practice.

“We have an opportunity to start next year off on the right note, and it’s kind of like when you play in a bowl game for football where you get a break from your conference season and then you have a big game at the end of the year,” Polley said. “We’re taking this game as a super important game for us. They’re a great team, and we want to see how we stack up against some of the best.”

With finals week approaching at BU, Polley added that his players concentrating on exams and projects is also crucial to a successful end of the season.

“We want to come out and want to have a great week of practice and exams,” Polley said. “Guys in the [Questrom School of Business’] Core [program] are doing their finals this week, so there’s some distractions there. But on the field, we have two hours to think about Duke and get prepared. It should be a great team.”

Jonathan Sigal contributed to the reporting of this article.