Lacrosse Opens Regular Season Sunday at Johns Hopkins 2/20/02

The Vanderbilt women's lacrosse team headed to Chapel Hill, North Carolina, last weekend to participate in the South of the Border preseason tournament. The tournament attracted over 20 university squads from acrosse the country. Vanderbilt scrimmaged all-day Saturday, facing-off against Richmond, Duke, Columbia, North Carolina and La Salle.

Head Coach Cathy Swezey has once again set the Commodores up with one of the strongest schedules in the nation. Seven of Vanderbilt's opponents are ranked in the preseason top-15. Swezey and her squad are looking forward to the new season.

"I expect our team to play with confidence, to be the harder working team on the field and to play at a high level regardless of the opponent," said Swezey. "Last weekend's competition was good -- it is obvious more each year that division one lacrosse is balancing out. The tournament was a good learning experience for us. We are ready to take this season on one game at a time and go from there."

The Commodores begin regular season action on Sunday when they travel to Baltimore, Maryland, to play Johns Hopkins at 1 pm eastern. That contest marks the opening of the American Lacrosse Conference -- a seven-team league whose charter members also include Davidson, Northwestern, Ohio, Ohio State and Penn State. Vanderbilt's first home game is against the Nittany Lions on March 2nd at 2 pm.