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The IFP - Halton Hills | Thursday, June 17,2021 | 20 Club S de lecture 5, Gira Encouragez les enfants 4 lire tout |’été! Register and join Halton Hills Public Library for the TD Summer Reading Club Challenge! Tine tum lacins Jume 19%m « Sign up on Beanstack or at HHPL - Discover great reads, log your reading progress and earn badges towards your goal - For every badge earned you'll be entered into the Grand Prize Draws!” *Sponsored by the Acton and Georgetown branches of TD Canada Trust. IBNEWS ‘ONE OF THE HAPPIEST MOMENTS OF MY LIFE’ LOCAL LACROSSE PLAYER WINS NCAA TITLE HERB GARBUTT hgarbutt@metroland.com It was to be a promising year for the Lindenwood Lions. Many of the team's vet- erans had taken a year off to line up ers senior sea- sons witha ip that was to bea contender for the NCAA Division 2 lacrosse championship, which the uri school was set to host. The team had just fin- ished a three-game sweep onaroad trip to improve to 9-1 when their coach gat ered them on the sideline and told them their season Was over. "It was heartbreaking," said Georgetown's Meghan Rea, then a second-year at- tack on the Lions. "We all knew it might be our last game. There was a lot of in- formation on the news. The NHLand the NBA had shut down. Seeing our seniors so upset, a was a hard bus ride a COVID- 19 pandem- ic may have claimed Lin- denwood's shot at a nation- al title, but the Lions re- turned this season even more 4 blomina They won their first 14 games, in- cluding a 12-10 victory over Indianapolis, the top- ranked team in the coun- ry. On May 21, Rea scored twice ina12-9 win in thena- tional semifinal. Two days later, her 15th goal of the season: b broke all tel in the cham] ship game as the Lions roared out to al45 id. "By far, my favourite goal I've ever scored be- cause of how big the stage was and how important it bird to get that lead," Rea sai Lindenwood then held off a late charge to secure a 14-12 victory to win the team's first-ever NCAA ti- tle. "It was kind of crazy," Rea said. "I hugged my Hiend for about two min- and I was crying hap- w tears, It was one of the happiest moments of my life." Rea played hockey and soccer as a kid, but when she was 11, she start looking for a new summer sport. A friend recom- mended lacrosse. “I wasn't that good at the beginning," she _ said. “Hockey I understood, anc I got good at it. Lacrosse) was so complex, there were so many challenges." She quickly met those challenges. Though she al- ways thought she would Don Adams photo Meghan Rea, left, helped the Lindenwood Lions win the NCAA Division 2 lacrosse title. The junior attack scored 15 goals in 18 games. pursue a hockey scholar- ship, she soon realized tunities available for her in lacrosse. "I had to sit down and have a tough conversation about where I was going to put my time and effort," she said, "And I chose la- crosse." She began attending E) Ev erest Academy, a spol based school in aoa where she was named var- sity female athlete of the year and the lacrosse team's MVP. That earned her a schol- arship to Lindenwood, where she was named a team captain this year. And now she can say captain of anational champion. With a two-week quaran- tine since returning from school, Rea's had plenty of time to rewatch the game and relive the moment. "It's still sinking in," she said.