The 2013 men’s lacrosse season holds new excitement, with new rules and procedures being implemented to speed up the game, and a match against a team from California approaching.

According to men’s varsity head coach Matthew Blair, lacrosse had started to “slow down too much” and was becoming “too specialized.” The two major changes include the elimination of the horn and timeout for subbing and the addition of a shot clock.

In the past, when the ball went out of bounds, the referees would wait and allow teams to take the time to sub their players, and then would blow the horn signaling the players to resume play. Now, the horn and this extra time will be eliminated. Subbing will have to be made on the fly. This means while coaches can sub at any point during the game, the referees will not stop play for it.

“Lacrosse had gotten to the point [where] people were making a sub left and right every time the ball went out of bounds,” Blair said.

The addition of the 30-second shot clock will help keep teams from holding the ball without trying to shoot. It is left up to the referees’ discretion to decide if the team is not attacking the goal and to initiate the shot clock. Therefore, it will not be used every time a team is on offense, but only when they are not attacking the goal.

According to Blair, the shot clock may make some teams play more of a zone defense, instead of man-to-man defense, and guard areas instead of each player guarding a specific person.

“It’s going to be hard to adjust. All the teams are going to have to learn as they go, but it will make the game faster ,” junior Michael Thompson, who’s on the men’s varsity lacross team, said.

In addition to the major changes, other small changes will be implemented. Colored tape will have to be put on the players’ sticks that do the faceoff to help the referees make sure they are not cheating.

According to Blair, “Every team has to have six balls on all four sides of the field.” Also, every time the ball goes out of bounds, there will have to be a quick restart of the ball.

All of these new rules and regulations will create “more possessions” and “more shots” according to Blair, but none of the rules will give one team an advantage over another.

“I think it’s good ultimately, but it’s going to be tough for referees to manage all the new responsibility,” he said.

In fact, the number of referees at a game will have to increase from two to three for the game to run properly. These changes like the number of referees and extra balls will cost more money for JC. While the balls are a minor expense, referee

In addition to changes with the league, the JC men’s varsity lacrosse team will also play a Californian team from Menlo-Atherton High School that is coming to Maryland.  The game will take place on Good Friday, March 29, at noon.

“[The team from California] wanted to play some teams that they would match up well with,” Blair said.

According to Blair, because Maryland is a “more established” lacrosse area with a better “lacrosse tradition,” they wanted to play JC. How they found JC or why they decided to play JC is unknown to Blair. The teams will be having a meatless cookout together after their game.

Kailey Tracy is the Copy Chief for The Patriot and jcpatriot.com.