No. 4 Florida opens its season against No. 1 North Carolina on Saturday at noon in its first game without its inaugural class.
In their stead, seniors Cara Canington and Krista Grabher will lead the team — loaded with 11 true freshmen — into the first top-five match of the season.
With the first game of the season just a day away, freshmen Mollie Stevens and Chloe O’Haire are ready to get on the field in their first collegiate game.
“I’m so excited,” O’Haire said. “I’m really nervous though. I can’t believe that it is already happening; I feel like it all happened so fast.”
Junior All-American Shannon Gilroy has been a part of the welcome committee for the newest additions to the team. The two seniors, Gilroy and the rest of the junior class have been instrumental in making the freshmen feel a part of the team, O’Haire said.
Gilroy has been a major contributor for Florida, scoring a team-high 52 goals last season and finishing second on the team with 65 points.
Florida started its season with a win against UNC in 2013 — the team’s first win against North Carolina since the program began in 2010. Florida went on to complete the season 18-3 and 4-1 in the American Lacrosse Conference.
“I know the past few years we’ve only had one win against UNC, and we’ve played them first every year and that was last year,” Gilroy said. “From that game on our momentum just got better and better, so hopefully that will happen again this year.”
The Tar Heels went 18-3 last season and finished 4-1 in Atlantic-Coast-Conference play, completing the year with the school’s first national championship.
Coach Amanda O’Leary said her team’s matchup against UNC would be a tough game and noted that it just recently lost to the U.S. lacrosse team in double overtime.
“They’re a great team, they have tons of talent, they’re fast, and they have experience,” O’Leary said.
Starting off the season with a win would be great for Florida, especially because the team is is so young and expectations are so great, Gilroy said.
“We lost a core group of girls who had a lot of expectations for themselves, so now I think we have our own expectations that we want to reach,” Gilroy said.
“Starting on Saturday, we’re just going to go in and play our best no matter the outcome.”
Follow Eden Otero on Twitter @edenotero_l
