It was the first varsity game and my coach put me in. As I went on the field I knew the game was on the line and I couldn’t mess up. The ball was thrown down to my end of the field and the ball got thrown to me. As I went to catch the ball it bounced off the end of my stick. To me this was the end of the world; I had messed up the game. Even though I knew the game was a loss.

For my whole lacrosse career I had been waiting for this day, high school lacrosse game day. I had worked so hard and put in the time that really counts away from the field and hitting the wall to become confident with both hands. As we did warm-ups I was nervous and I was intimidated by all the 6ft defenders on the other team that I would have fight for ground balls with and outperform. I had played in championships, finals, and other huge games but those could not prepare for how nervous I was to prove to everyone that I could play on their level, I felt like throwing up.

As halftime reached an end we all got in the shade to talk about the first half and what we could do better and what went well. Our whole team put everything on the field and we were still in it with one of the top teams. The horn signaled queuing us to wrap it up and our coach called out the players going in. “Scott, Nathan, and Brian are in on attack…” I couldn’t believe he said it. He actually called my name. My heart was pumping as I ran onto the field as all the players pounded on my helmet and I knew I had to give it my all. As I took my spot on the field and the whistle blew I could hear my coach in my head saying to always give it your all and you always fail unless you try. The whistle blew and we won the face off the ball came down the field and we scored the first point.

We had the top faceoff player in league playing for us and that is how we had won the 3rd quarter. I got the ball but moved it right away to keep the pace going. All the other players could dodge way better and I knew they could do it so I threw the ball to them and relied on them to do the work. It was now the fourth quarter and they had picked up on the offense. The clock was running down and I knew I had to do something because the game was on the line and I could see on Scott’s face the he was drained of energy. The defense stripped the ball and our middie was sprinting down the field. We had to keep it because one of our best defenders had fouled out. The clock was almost out and I could see the ball flying towards me. As I went to catch it the ball bounced off of the end and my heart dropped. Once I felt it hit the plastic I knew I had let my team down and there was no way I could get it back. I had failed.

I played my hardest out of anger the last few minutes but there was only so much I could do. As they crossed the line everyone knew the game was over and we had our first lose. Losing is always hard and it’s never a way to start a season. I knew that it was all on me and I failed the whole team. Nobody said anything but I knew that it was on everyone’s mind and especially on mine. I thought about it all night and I still can’t forget how I failed the team that game.