1969?

Reading Mike Mulligan's letter brought back some great memories that I wanted to share.

I was a senior on the '72 team (that beat Amherst, Williams, Bowdoin, Dartmouth, UNH, Villanova, Swarthmore and Haverford, among others) and Mike was a freshman (one of the famous all-freshman midfield line that year), so we overlapped for one year.

Mike reports that "1975 marked the beginning of Midd's recognized dynasty in this sport". There is some justification for this, as this was the first year Midd could go to the ECAC, but my telling of the story is somewhat different, as my perspective is three years earlier.

In my time one measured how good a lacrosse team was by their "New England" ranking.  There was no DI, II, and III in this lacrosse poll, and Midd was ranked along with U Mass, Harvard, Dartmouth, Yale, Williams etc. I do not remember our ranking senior year, but, if it had been in the top 5, I probably would have.

My freshman year of 1969, when I played on the then freshman team, our varsity was 13-1, and ranked #2 in New England, among all lacrosse teams in all divisions.  Midd's only defeat was to undefeated U Mass, by a score of 8-5.  U Mass ended up ranked #1 in New England.  All-Americans Ralph Sexton '69, midfield, Dave Bahnson '69, defense, and Rick Moore '69, goalie, were the stars along with Brad Bruce '72, an outstanding freshman midfielder from Holderness (and later All-American/North South Selection- all divisions). Midd played U Mass at Midd that year. The varsity lacrosse field was also the varsity soccer field in the fall, and the field did not drain well.  That field is now under the parking lot for the Center for the Arts.  It had been raining the day(s) before the game, so the game had to be moved to the practice lacrosse field (now the practice football field that has lights).  The freshman team supplemented the grounds crew to spread sand and hay to try to soak up the water.  A great game to watch.

So my perspective is that the great Middlebury lacrosse tradition started with the team of 1969.

I must say I did not know very much then or now about the records of the Midd lacrosse teams before 1969.  It is certainly possible that someone else's perspective claims that the great Middlebury lacrosse tradition started with the team of 1965, or whenever.

George Cady '72