Happy birthday, HPU Lacrosse. You just turned 10.
 
The women's program started a decade ago, and the men's program started a year after that. From the very start, HPU President Dr. Nido Qubein knew it was a good idea.
 
"Friends in the lacrosse world kept telling me HPU needs lacrosse," he says today. "We did our research. We hired two fabulous coaches who have been with us from the start, and we kept winning!"
 
Those two coaches are Lyndsey Boswell and Jon Torpey.
 
They find players who all spring from the same mold. They come from supportive families, and they're forged by discipline, hard work and the love for a game they learned at an early age.
 
They're good. And they're hungry.
 
As players in a program still considered young in the eyes of the college lacrosse world, they feel they have something to prove. So, when they come to HPU, they play with a passion that fuels their goal: HPU men's and women's lacrosse can compete with the best.
 
They have. And they've won.
 
They've beaten ranked teams once thought unbeatable, and because of their play, HPU's men's and women's lacrosse teams have been ranked nationally, too. And at the same time.
 
Now, to the kicker.
 
With the number of conference titles they've earned, both men's and women's lacrosse are HPU's most successful teams since the university began competing in 1999 in Division-1, the highest level of the NCAA.
 
Their seasons start this month. But here's a question: How did both programs get so successful in such a short period of time?
 
Start with the coaches.
 
They built it. And the players came.
 
 
Feeling Like Family
 
Know this. Boswell and Torpey are a lot alike.
 
Their offices exist a few dozen steps from one another in the second floor of the Witcher Athletic Center.
 
It's not uncommon for them to step into the other's office to talk about everything -- from the finer points of lacrosse to the best restaurant to eat in Asheville, North Carolina before an assistant coach proposes to his girlfriend.
 
Torpey asked Boswell for advice on that one a few months back.
 
Boswell coaches the women; Torpey, the men. Off the field, they're both warm and easygoing.  On the field, they're eagle-eyed and all business. Together, they are HPU's lacrosse dream team.
 
They're both stoked by the same competitive drive that fuels their teams. Ask them about their relationship, and they don't dive into their similar coaching philosophies. They'll talk about something much deeper.
 
"I see her like a sister," Torpey says. "We were raised the same way."
 
They both come from blue-collar backgrounds, raised in families full of tough love. They grew up with a lacrosse stick in their hands, and they played in the sport's biggest hothouse of competition and talent – Maryland.
 
Boswell grew up in Friendship, a tiny community 40 minutes south of Annapolis. She was one of six kids. Her dad was a race car driver; her mom held down two jobs; and growing up, she and her siblings all slept in one room when she was in elementary school. 
 
She started playing lacrosse as a sixth-grader and continued on through college where she became an All-American at Pfeiffer University.
 
Torpey hails from Baltimore. His parents were both nurses, and he was the younger of two sons. 
 
His dad worked in a mental hospital, his paternal grandfather was an iron worker at a Navy shipyard, and his maternal grandfather with only an eighth-grade education became a NYC bus driver, transit cop and later the deputy director of the NYC transit authority
 
He picked up lacrosse when he was 8, and his career led him to Ohio State where he became a Big Ten All-Academic selection and later as a professional player with five different teams.
 
Both Boswell and Torpey excelled as coaches – Boswell at her alma mater and St. Andrews College; Torpey at the University of Denver and Dartmouth College.
 
But High Point University, they saw, gave them a chance to create a program from the ground up. Boswell came to HPU in 2009; Torpey in 2010.
 
When they came to HPU, they both were two of the youngest coaches in D-1. Boswell started at HPU when she was 26. Torpey started at HPU when he was 32.
 
They came because they believed HPU was a place committed to providing the support and financial resources needed to excel.
 
That has happened.
 
"We feel like a baby in the lacrosse world," Boswell says of both men's and women's lacrosse programs at HPU. "People are catching on to what we are trying to do, it's attracting a lot of attention for the university, and our competitors are taking notice.
"Neither of us do what we do for the attention," she continues. "We just work hard and do what we can do to make our programs stronger. And there is a sense of pride for our university. It shows through our teams' hard work."
 
 
Creating Trust
 
Minutes before any game, Boswell will stand by the door of her locker room, and her players will sit on the floor around her, like kindergarteners in front of their teacher as she reads in class.
 
Boswell gets her players take 10 deep breaths to relax, and she asks them to think their favorite game, their favorite person or that special someone – mom, dad, or their significant other – who came to the game to watch them play.
 
Then, she talks about the importance of feeling green.
 
That's the color of being in the zone, playing your best and knowing you want the ball. That is much better than the two other colors they talk about – red for negative thoughts and yellow for average play.
 
Before they head to the field, Boswell ends with this:
 
"I love you, and I am proud of you. And remember, your only expectations today are to keep yourselves and your teammates green. Give the program the best version of yourself."
 
Boswell can be tough on her players. On the field, she is an in-your-face coach. But off the field, she is a counselor, mentor and confidante. She keeps her office door open, and her players come in to talk to her about anything.
 
Boswell does that to help her players become strong, confident women both on and off the field. That was the way she was raised in Friendship. Love and lacrosse in her house went hand in hand.
 
Boswell is not afraid to be vulnerable with her players. They've seen her cry over personal losses and get excited over her marriage last December and the birth of her daughter, her first child, in December. That kind of approach, Boswell says, allows her players to open up and trust one another – whether it's game time or not.
 
That trust, Boswell has found, can lead to creating a cohesive team that believes in itself.
 
Today, players talk about past wins. But they also talk about future possibilities. They want to go deeper into the NCAA Division-1 Tournament, way past the first round, and vie for a national championship.
 
They run, lift, practice and run some more, like a drill known as 300s, or running 25 yards up and back six times. They keep motivated in all sorts of ways. That includes reading quotes Boswell sends them by email and decorating their locker with painted blocks of wood.
 
Those blocks come from their teammates. Meredith Chapman, a redshirt senior from Apex, North Carolina, has four. One, painted light blue, reads:
 
There Will Be Obstacles
There Will Be Mistakes
But With Hard Work
THERE ARE NO LIMITS
 
Chapman's locker mantra came alive in the spring of 2017 when her team beat Towson, a national powerhouse. The final score: 21-15.
 
It was HPU Athletics first-ever NCAA Tournament win in any sport.
 
"It was the greatest feeling," says Chapman, the Big South Defensive Player and Scholar-Athlete of the Year. "It's that feeling you get when you realize all your hard work paid off, and you get this moment of clarity where you feel confident and think, 'Now I can see why we ran all those 300's.' We knew we could run past anyone.''
 
That's the makeup of Chapman's teammates – fast and fit, driven and coachable with all kinds of raw talent.
Those are the players Boswell and her two assistant coaches, Kelly McQuilkin and Holly Turner, recruit. When the players come to campus, they become part of a culture that envelopes them with support at every turn.
 
For example, every player on the team is part of a four-member group, and they meet every other week with the coaches. Those meetings turn into conversations about life on and off the field.
 
"That helps us keep in touch with how they're feeling and what they're doing, and it can be anything like 'Hey, why didn't you talk at practice?'" says Turner, who came to HPU two years ago after a stellar lacrosse career at University of Massachusetts-Amherst.
"It's really a chance to show them once again we care about them and want the best for them because we all know when you're not feeling good you're not going to play good," she says. "We want to make sure they're in the right mindset."
 
All those techniques do work. The many wins and conference titles show that. But there's no magic to it. Just hard work.
 
"I think it comes down to the people," Boswell says. "We look for players and coaches who put the team before themselves. They're selfless, and we all work together for a higher good."
 
'They're My Guys"
 
For Torpey's players, every week is a tough week.
 
They get up an hour before daybreak and meet Torpey, a whistle clenched between his teeth. He watches them go through drill after drill after drill.
 
The fireman's carry.
The wheelbarrow.
The 200 pushups.
The 200 sits ups.
The runs around the track and the runs up a hill.
Over and over. Torpey is always close. 
"If you have to throw up,'' Torpey barks. "Keep runnin'!''
 
They watch the sunrise. Practice continues. When they finish, sweat pours off them like water.
 
Day after day, month after month. The same thing.
 
They practice, lift and know the tenets of a 100-page players' manual that includes the pillars of the program: Personal Health, Family, Academics, Lacrosse, Social Life.
Torpey sees those themes as crucial in playing lacrosse and educating young men.
Like Boswell, Torpey is a motivator. Before every game, he'll give a fiery speech and say things like, "This team has wronged us in the past!''
 
Or sometimes, he'll get quiet. Like Boswell, Torpey will ask his players to visualize what has happened and what could be.
 
 "Close your eyes and take two breaths," he'll say to them. "Think about that time with your dads in the locker room. The team we're playing is trying to take that away from you, a memory that can last a lifetime.''
 
Tim Troutner Jr. remembers all that well.
 
He came to HPU because of Torpey. He played four years for Torpey. He graduated in May with a business degree, and in his senior year, he was named First Team All-Conference and Second-Team All-American.
 
As HPU's goalie, he owns the program's record for saves -- 560.
 
Last summer, Troutner played goalie in the Redwoods LC in the Premiere Lacrosse League, a six-team professional league that markets itself as featuring 150 of the best lacrosse players in the world.
 
In July, he was named to the Premiere Lacrosse League's all-star team. Torpey sees Troutner, who he calls "Timmy," as one of the best goalies in the world. 
 
But Troutner knows he didn't get there without Torpey's help.
 
"He's a pretty wired guy on the field," Troutner says. "But off the field, he's really cool, like a second father to all of us."
 
That's the intent, Torpey says.
 
"They're my guys," says Torpey, a married father of three. "I tell them, 'If you give me everything you have on and off the field, I'll be there with you for the rest of your life.' It's the truth."
 
Torpey credits his assistant coaches -- Ken Broschart, Justin Tuma and Connor McKemey -- as well as strength and conditioning coach, Andrew Crossley, to helping mold the team into a winner.
 
Ask him about that from his second-floor office overlooking Vert Stadium, and he talks more about relationships rather than similar coaching philosophies.
 
"It's like working in an environment with your best friends," Torpey says. "We challenge each other, and we talk about the good, the bad and the ugly here in the office, but when we leave, we walk onto the field as a unified front."
McKemey knows that environment well. He came to HPU to play lacrosse in Torpey's second season, and after graduating in 2017, he became the team's director of operations before being named a volunteer assistant coach in August 2018.
 
For seven years as both a player and a coach, McKemey has watched the program grow.
 
"We came off early on as a bunch of kids with a chip on our shoulder and our backs against the wall," he says. "We had something to prove because we were a new program, but we knew we had something special."
 
The players do believe that – even in 2018 when they started their 0-6. After that rough start, Torpey had a heart-to-heart talk with his players and reached out to all the players'  parents by email.
 
 "Keep believing in our team," Torpey wrote. "We've got a great group of guys."
His parents supported him. So did the players. After the 0-6 start, the team has gone 20-5.
 
"Our guys know what it's like to win," McKemey says. "And winning your games, that can become addictive."
 
The Determination of Two Teams  
 
Like Boswell and Torpey, their teams are close. One finishes practice and the other starts. One is playing a game and the other is in the stands sitting together, cheering loud.
 
That synergy, the players say, is crucial. It has created a brother-sister bond between both programs. As for the teams, players say there's no cliques based on playing time or years at HPU. They see themselves as one, mentors to one another.
 
They practice six days a week, at least two hours at a time. On some days, they get up an hour before daybreak, hit the practice field at sunrise and go to class sometimes without a shower.
 
Their work ethic breeds respect, and the wins come.
 
The exposure comes, too.
 
From national magazines to ESPN, HPU is no longer considered a dark horse in the world of collegiate lacrosse, both men and women.
 
"We're not really the underdogs any longer," says senior Ben Baker, a computer science major from Columbus, Ohio. "We're expected to win big games, and we expect that out of ourselves. And being in that national spotlight makes it even better. I love it.
"We're taking down those blue bloods, and we're showing everyone we're just as good as them, and we can play against anybody. That is pretty cool."
 
But those wins don't happen by accident.
 
Players on both the men's and women's teams work at it. They work with their strength and conditioning coaches and hone their bodies and improve their skills by using the innovative technology in HPU's biomechanics lab.
 
They also tap into the expertise of a sports psychologist and listen to motivational speakers in the off season and during the season to help get their minds right to practice and play.
 
And they listen to Boswell and Torpey.
 
Both coaches are like surrogate parents. They help their players on all aspects of life – from heartache and staying healthy, to schoolwork and navigating their future.
 
That kind of sage counsel helps teammates feel like family, and they realize lacrosse is a guidebook to life.
 
Like Samantha Herman, the senior captain who graduated in May.
 
"We knew we'd be better people off the field because of those early morning workouts and late nights finishing up homework," she says. "It made everyone better."
And HPU's role?
 
"It starts with our president, Dr. Qubein," Herman responds. "He wants an inspiring environment with caring people and an extraordinary education. I was impacted by all three."
 
 
Building A Powerhouse
 
The newness of the men's and women's programs has made the players scrappy. Against more established programs, players say they fight for respect because they long to build HPU into a lacrosse powerhouse ranked year in and year out.
 
So, players come to HPU because of Boswell and Torpey. But they also come because of the draw of creating High Point University into a lacrosse dynasty.
 
Take Abby Hormes, a junior from Fallston, Maryland. After accepting an offer to play for HPU, she sat in the stands when Boswell's team beat Towson 21-15 in the spring of 2017 – the same game that gave Chapman "the greatest feeling."
 
 "It gave me chills watching them," Hormes says today. "Just the fact that I was going there in the next year, that made me super happy. I knew I had made right choice."
 
Last spring, Hormes was named Offensive Player of the Year in their conference, the Big South.
 
Then there is Asher Nolting.
 
He came to HPU from Greenwood Village, Colorado. Last spring, he was named second-team All American by Inside Lacrosse Magazine and highlighted on ESPN when he scored with a goal by flipping the ball behind his head when HPU played UVA in February in Charlottesville, Virginia.
 
"WHAA?!' ESPN's Scott Van Pelt yelled repeatedly.
 
It was some kind of shot, a shot that helped No. 11 HPU knock off No. 9 UVA 14-13.
That's indicative, Nolting says, of how his team plays.
 
 "This is what makes our program special," Nolting says. "We are all so close, from the top to the bottom of the roster. We know everything about our guys. We're all like brothers, and we'll do anything for each other. There are no cliques, and that makes it easy for us to play for each other. We play hard."
 
There's no better example than a Wednesday in February.
 
 
The Big Night in Durham
 
In Jamestown, North Carolina, a few miles from HPU's campus, Chapman was babysitting Torpey's three children. She along with Tommy, Maggie and Bridget were watching on Chapman's laptop their dad's lacrosse team play Duke in Durham.
 
As she was getting them ready for bed, Chapman stopped. She realized what they were seeing.
 
"Your dad's team is about to beat the Number 2 team in the country," she told them. "Let's watch."
 
At the game in Durham, Baker was spent.
 
He had scored three goals against Duke -- and against guys he had played against and seen all along the recruiting trail in high school. As the game wound down, he found himself trying to quiet the thought pinging in his mind.
 
 "They still could score five times in the last minute," he told himself. "Gotta be ready!"
Troutner, HPU's goalie, was ready. He had already made 19 saves that game, and he was ready for a few more. But as the seconds began to tick away, it hit him.
 
 "Holy cow," he thought, "we did it."
 
HPU outplayed Duke, the No. 2 team in the nation. They won. 
 
When the game ended, Nolting went running looking for Troutner. He found him near the goal and hugged him hard.
 
 "I knew we could do it!" he said. "This is why we wake up at 6 o'clock in the morning!"
On the sidelines, Torpey remained stoic even as the game drew to a close. He knew how well coached Duke was. But when he saw zeroes on the clock, he looked up in the stands and spotted his wife, Tegan.
 
He saw how excited she was, and as his players on the sidelines stormed the field, he got it.
 
His team -- "my guys," he calls them -- just beat Duke 13-9.
 
Back in Jamestown, Chapman had put Tommy, Maggie and Bridget to bed. The house was quiet; her mind wasn't. She felt this sense of excitement building inside of her, especially with the parallels she realized between the two teams.
 
Her team beat Duke the year before. Now, the men's team did the same thing.
 
Ask her about that win a few months later, and she still gets pumped.
 
"They were making a name themselves, and they were making a name for us as well," she says. "They're branding HPU. I've told people, 'Maybe you haven't heard about us, but you've heard about our men's team. They beat No. 2 team in the nation.'"
 
That win last February in Durham was the highest ranked opponent HPU had ever beaten in the program's history.
 
During Pawscars, the student-athletes annual award ceremony in May, the Duke win was voted the Game of the Year. As for the players, that win made it official – HPU has one of the best men's lacrosse teams in the country.
 
Baker feels that way.
 
As a senior, he's one of the team's leaders. He earned it. At the Pawscars, he was selected as HPU's Breakthrough Athlete of the Year.
 
He knows his team will come into the season with the potential of being ranked nationally once again and having the chance to beat teams like Duke and make the NCAA Tournament for the first time.
 
That is no longer seen as a wish. That, Baker says, can happen.
 
"The past two years, we've worked extremely hard," Baker says. "We practiced early, ran a ton and lifted all the time. We knew how good we were, but it took one big win to help us know that we could do it.
 
"Seeing it happen in real life let us know that it's happening now, not in the future," he continues. "But that win took us to another level. We now think we can win a national championship. There's always been that belief. But now we know we can do it."
 
 
Written in the spring of 2019 by High Point University Senior Writer Jeri Rowe