The UMBC women’s lacrosse team opens its 2013 slate, the first under co-head coaches Amy Appelt and Tony Giro, on Saturday, Feb. 16 when the Retrievers travel to American for a noon contest at Jacobs Field.
UMBC made a trip to its third straight America East Championships last season, finishing with a 3-3 mark in league play and earning the third seed in the tournament. The Retrievers look to build upon their semifinals appearance from a year ago and get back to the league title match for the third time in four seasons. Tony Giro and Amy Appelt enter their first season as co-head coaches of the program, having been on UMBC’s coaching staff for five and four years, respectively. The duo return 12 letterwinners and seven starters from a squad that defeated a pair of top-20 programs in 2012.
The Retrievers were one of four teams to earn a first place vote in the 2013 America East Preseason Coaches’ Poll, receiving one first-place vote and 19 total votes from the seven coaches. Stony Brook, who defeated the Retrievers in the league tournament semifinals last season as the No. 2 seed, was picked to finish first in the conference after returning all 12 of its starters from a year ago. Regular season America East Champion Boston University and AEC tournament champion Albany were tied for second with 29 votes apiece. UMBC followed in fourth, in front of Vermont (17), New Hampshire (13) and Binghamton (seven).
“Regardless of where you are in the preseason poll, on any day, we feel that anyone – if you prepare and do the things you need to do – can beat any opponent,” Appelt said. “At this point, every game is a new game. We’re not looking ahead to April or May; we’re looking ahead to American and taking it game-by-game, week-by-week.
“For a team that’s so young that’s how we have to look at it,” Appelt continued. “We always have the hunt in our mind, we want to get to that championship weekend, but in order to get there we have to take care of each piece first.”