The St. John’s Prep lacrosse team capped off an amazing 2022 campaign by capturing the Division I State Championship. The 2023 season will see a different Eagles team, but their expectations and benchmarks remain the same.
“We have outcome goals and process goals every season,” St. John’s Head Coach Pynchon said. “Our outcome goals are always the same: Win our conference, obtain a high seed in the state tournament, and then make a deep run. Our process goals change every year, as each team is different.”
The Eagles have only been practicing for just over a week now, so they do not know what their process goals are quite yet. Pynchon said these goals will start becoming clear soon.
“Next week is when we will begin mapping out what our process goals are going to be,” he said. “Will we need to heighten our focus on offensive attack, offensive possession, shooting, defensive possession, or creating turnovers? These questions, amongst many others, we will start answering, which is always an exciting time.”
Last year’s St. John’s team had a senior-laden defensive squad, but that is not the case this season.
“We had eight seniors on the defensive side of the field last year, and this year we only have four,” Pynchon said. “We are going to need our underclassmen to step up, and I am confident that will be the case.”
The Eagles do have the luxury of bringing back most of their offensive group from the championship squad, as they will have eight seniors suiting up this year.
“It is definitely a luxury and important to have a lot of our continuity back on offense,” Pynchon said. “I am intrigued to see this group take the field.”
The Eagles do have a nice mix of experience versus inexperience, but Pynchon emphasized how important the underclassmen are in order to have a successful season.
“If we have a strong crop of freshmen and sophomores on our team, then positive results will happen,” Pynchon said. “If the underclassmen are missing passes in practice and their focus is not there, then this will affect everyone on the team negatively. We are as strong as our freshmen and sophomore group, and I truly believe that.”
Pynchon was elated when he spoke about what makes him most excited about this year’s group.
“The depth we have on this team is amazing,” Pynchon said. “We have really good top tier talent, but this may be the deepest team I have ever coached. Having this type of depth is going to pay off in a big way.”
Pynchon mentioned his front line talent, and had to bring up the senior offensive duo of Jimmy Ayers and Alex Perault.
“We are going to be leaning on Jimmy and Alex on and off the field,” Pynchon said. “Jimmy is a third-year starter at attack and Alex has improved so much at the midfield position. Jimmy and Alex are also great leaders, and I am glad they will be leading the charge.”
St. John’s season will officially begin on Thursday, March 30, when they will travel to take on Andover.
