On the whole, athletes are a superstitious lot. Many follow the same pregame routines night in and night out believing it will make them perform well. Michael Jordan has been known to wear a pair of old Carolina practice shorts under his Bulls uniform for a measure of good luck. Utah coach Rick Majerus sticks with a lucky sweater to keep his team on a roll.
When slumping, athletes often break from the old routine and begin a new to tradition to get a fresh start. If this idea proves to be true, one would expect the women's lacrosse team to be searching for a new pre-game warm up, or some other good luck charm to snap it out of a three-game losing streak and return the Blue Devils to their winning ways.
According to Duke coach Kerstin Kimel, however, the answer is much simpler than any complex routine or superstition. The answer lies in going back to the fundamentals of the game.
"Right now, our main focus is on the basics-we have to keep the approach simple." Kimel said. "We need to go back to the fundamentals of catching and ball control."
In tonight's match up versus Vanderbilt (7-6), the Blue Devils (7-4, 1-2 in the Atlantic Coast Conference) face a formidable foe in their last home game of the year at the Duke Lacrosse Stadium. Gametime is set for 7 p.m. in a night game that features two teams struggling to gain momentum for the crucial stretch run of the season.
The Commodores, like Duke, are a third year program trying to compete on the national scene. Vanderbilt, however, has struggled through a coaching change and has been plagued with injuries all year long. Despite these setbacks, the Commodores have managed to maintain a winning record to this point in the season.
"Vanderbilt is missing a lot of key players," Kimel said. "But they have a lot of short and scrappy players that really come out and compete. We can't look past them or past this game."
Besides looking for a win, the Blue Devils see this game as a chance to prepare for the upcoming ACC Tournament this weekend in Charlottesville, Va. Duke is already guaranteed the third seed in the tournament and will play Virginia in a rematch of last Saturday's lopsided loss.
Duke finds itself at a critical juncture of the season because every game has postseason implications. To qualify for the NCAA Tournament, Duke needs to end the season on a roll.
A win tonight and an impressive showing in the ACC Tournament this weekend will improve Duke's chances of qualifying for the NCAA Tournament in May.
"At this point, every game is important for the NCAA's." Kimel said. "This is a year when anyone can beat anyone on any given night. We just have to take care of business."
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