Money, mud fests and melted cleats: Inside USC men’s lacrosse club’s championship win
The South Carolina men’s lacrosse club team had three days to come up with $20,000.
The Gamecocks were seeking a second-straight national championship win — but they were in a bind for purchasing airplane tickets to travel to the mid-May tournament in Round Rock, Texas. Sixteen of the 74 teams in Division I MCLA lacrosse reach the league’s tournament each year.
With the way club sports are financed, the South Carolina team doesn’t budget for the postseason. How the team operates and how it funded its trip to the MCLA finals offer a glimpse into how the club sport experience differs from NCAA athletics at South Carolina.
Behind the scenes, University of South Carolina students largely run the men’s club lacrosse operation. Such a setup is the standard for all of the school’s 56 club sport programs.
“I wouldn’t say it’s quite like a full-time job, but it felt like a job,” senior defensive midfielder and club president William Lohoff-Gaida said. “There’s just a lot that goes into it. … But I wouldn’t trade it for anything, to help run the team and help the team be successful makes it worth it.”
The unknown travel needs of postseason play keep South Carolina from budgeting for that in the team’s initial round of player dues, Lohoff-Gaida said. . The club costs this season came out to $2,490 per player for veterans and $2,985 for first-year team members — money that covers everything from regular-season travel to jerseys and league fees.
More funds were needed to get to the national tournament. The club was quoted $420 for each plane ticket but needed to purchase all of them within three days before prices nearly doubled, Lohoff-Gaida said.
In need of quick funds for a 45-man roster and four coaches, the Gamecocks took up another round of dues — $750 per player — and partnered with Columbia restaurant Village Idiot Pizza to help with airfare, hotel rooms and a shuttle bus to the Round Rock Multipurpose Complex.
A key revenue stream came through an online fundraiser, which accumulated over $14,600 from 84 donors.
“I remember our treasurer saying if we didn’t have this fundraiser, we would not have been able to (buy the tickets),” Lohoff-Gaida said.
The work of the students doesn’t go unnoticed. Club head coach Peter Candela handles much of the X’s and O’s, as South Carolina sport programs work solely with students for everything from finances to scheduling.
“Other student-athletes, they just have to worry about ... their other sports or whatever it is,” Candela said. “Our guys, they have to go through logistics, work with club sports. … They really do have a lot, and it’s pretty impressive.”
Supporting a student-led operation
USC sport programs coordinator Justin Furlough remembered reading a tweet suggesting the head of club sports become the university’s next athletic director after the South Carolina men’s lacrosse club won this year’s championship.
Through a grin, Furlough said he didn’t want the stress of USC athletic director Ray Tanner’s job. Instead, he brought emphasis to how the students take the lead in Gamecock club sports.
“How did men’s lacrosse get to this point? Well, that’s the cool thing, because I can’t speak to the specifics of that,” Furlough said. “All of our organizations are student-led, student-run. They’re responsible for all of their on-field success.”
Furlough said his department connects teams to resources pertaining to travel, funds insurance for sports with higher risks and provides athletic trainers in the event of injuries. Most everything else goes through the athletes, who plan budgets and present them to a sport club executive board that allocates $35,977 from the university across 56 programs based on proposed budgets.
That pot will soon grow, though, as the student-run executive board negotiated a $70,000 allocation from the university on a trial basis for the 2023 fiscal year. Furlough said it will be the first time sport programs’ funding has been raised since at least 2006.
Lohoff-Gaida said the Gamecocks’ men’s lacrosse club received $2,000 from the school this year, while estimating this year’s full season — including the championship run in Texas — cost roughly $200,000.
The bulk of expenses are due to travel and hotel stays, he said, as South Carolina schedules regular-season games in Arizona, Virginia and Florida throughout the season. The trips are necessary for preserving national relevance, he said.
“If we want to maintain a high ranking, we have to play high-ranked teams,” Lohoff-Gaida said. “That means you have to travel a lot, and sometimes you have to travel pretty far. … That really adds up.”
The club’s student members are proactive with securing funds, operating an online merchandise store and securing a partnership with Village Idiot Pizza. Gamecocks lacrosse held a night at the restaurant where Village Idiot set aside a percentage of sales to the team, as well as branded T-shirts and koozies to sell, Lohoff-Gaida said.
The support from Village Idiot this year went further than financial. The restaurant hosted a watch party for South Carolina’s national championship game.
“They opened up early there, and apparently it was a pretty good environment,” Lohoff-Gaida said. “They all enjoyed it, so that was cool.”
South Carolina women’s soccer coach Shelley Smith is another strong supporter of the men’s lacrosse club. Smith and her husband, associate women’s soccer coach Jamie Smith, bought dinner for the lacrosse team during their championship run in Texas.
“They’re huge fans,” Candela said. “They’re always just supporting the team.”
Building a championship culture
Now back-to-back MCLA champions, the South Carolina men’s lacrosse club has developed into a destination for players looking to stay involved in the sport while keeping a balanced lifestyle.
The Gamecocks’ roster features players from 10 different states, with 31 of the 45 hailing from outside South Carolina. Many come from “traditional lacrosse hotbeds,” Lohoff-Gaida said, such as Maryland and New York.
Candela said South Carolina’s club lacrosse team also includes transfers from Division I programs. Lohoff-Gaida calls the balance between life and lacrosse with USC the “perfect storm.”
“Division I’s really a grind,” Lohoff-Gaida said. “Some people love it, but some people would rather spend some time more on schoolwork or social stuff. At those programs, it’s like, get up at 5 a.m., then practice, meetings, film all day — you really have very little free time.”
An estimated 150 students tried out for the team this year, and Candela and his staff selected 45 for the roster. The players must meet eligibility requirements, such as maintaining at least a 2.5 GPA and enrollment in at least 12 credit hours.
Once the roster is built, aligning schedules for practice time poses challenges. The club practices twice a week but seems to improve the most from playing games, Lohoff-Gaida said, which factors into the Gamecocks seeing rocky starts and strong finishes.
Candela sees how team culture benefits in limited practice time. When the Gamecocks have a chance to play, they play with full effort.
“A lot of these guys left big programs and transferred in because they didn’t want the full-time lacrosse duty, so the two days a week that they’re out there, they want to be there,” Candela said. “They like competing and having fun, but we also let them have their separate time to enjoy college.”
This year, South Carolina started 3-3 before ending on a 14-game winning streak capped off with the title. Lohoff-Gaida remembers the Gamecocks’ last loss well.
Often, Lohoff-Gaida checked South Carolina’s home turf at the Bluff Road practice fields near Williams-Brice Stadium before a game day. If rain is in the forecast, he’ll have to find another place to play.
Before Georgia Tech came to Columbia in March, Lohoff-Gaida found the field conditions unplayable. It was up to the club to find a new spot.
“The whole group of guys — myself and the president and everyone else who’s in charge — we’re problem-solvers,” Candela said. “We just kind of relish in that.”
Candela, who grew up in nearby Blythewood, said he leverages connections he has to area high school coaches in the event of rain. The Gamecocks ended up playing Georgia Tech at Heathwood Hall Episcopal School in Columbia.
The weather still caused issues on an alternate field. Lohoff-Gaida called the loss a “mud fest.”
“It was just a muddy, muddy game,” Lohoff-Gaida said. “We lost that one. It was hard.”
One month later, during their winning streak, the Gamecocks won an overtime rivalry game at Clemson. The game was held in the Tigers’ soccer stadium, a highlight of Lohoff-Gaida’s senior season.
Lohoff-Gaida basked in the environment, estimating the 6,500-capacity Historic Riggs Field was “probably 80%” full. He said the lacrosse club has tried to play games at USC’s Stone Stadium, but it’s a feat the Gamecocks have yet to achieve.
“The Smiths have always been on board,” Lohoff-Gaida said. “But it’s above their head, I guess. … I’m sure we could get a lot of people in there, and I think it’d be a great experience for the university and a cool thing to put on. Maybe one day we’ll see that.”
USC won 10 straight games before nationals, including a victory in the SouthEastern Lacrosse Conference Division I Tournament, earning its ticket to the national tournament in Round Rock, Texas.
Celebrating the club’s victory
Just getting to Texas was already a challenge for the Gamecocks’ men’s lacrosse club. Winning the championship in grueling heat added another hurdle.
South Carolina played four games in under a week, defeating Arizona, Liberty and BYU en route to a third meeting of the season with Georgia Tech. The Gamecocks met the Yellow Jackets in their final loss last March, but they’d avenged that game once with a win in their April conference tournament.
Lohoff-Gaida recalled the brutal conditions of the Saturday morning championship game, where the temperature rose to 92 degrees. He said parts of USC’s cleats melted in the heat.
But South Carolina used an equally hot offensive start and the depth of its roster to defeat Georgia Tech a third time. Lohoff-Gaida said the support that ensued was unexpected.
The lacrosse club earned shoutouts from women’s basketball coach Dawn Staley, football coach Shane Beamer and country music star Darius Rucker on social media. South Carolina lit up the Capstone building on campus in celebration. Candela loved the recognition and hopes to see more in the future.
Lohoff-Gaida said he would support an NCAA lacrosse program at South Carolina. While he understands the difficulty of starting a new sport, Lohoff-Gaida also noted how the Gamecocks already attract players from areas filled with lacrosse talent. He could see USC becoming a top-five program quickly.
“They know we’re here now, which is cool,” Lohoff-Gaida said. “But it’d be cool to see the support go even farther in the coming years. Maybe one day, it’ll be a Division I team.”
Furlough said the question of whether a South Carolina club has ever become an NCAA sport comes up often, but to his knowledge it hasn’t happened at USC before.
Furlough is cautious when discussing that prospect with leaders from current club sports. He emphasizes the sport program department’s policy that any student who pays dues and meets requirements cannot be turned away from a team if they want to be included, even if they don’t play or travel. That isn’t a given in NCAA athletics.
“We’ve had some clubs come to us and say, ‘Hey, we want this to happen,’ and we let them know if this is to happen, we can’t guarantee that you stay on the team,” Furlough said. “If you move to athletics, maybe they start recruiting, and if they bring in better people, you might not be there. That’s kind of the hard reality.”
Candela believes the strength of South Carolina’s current program is rooted in its operation as a club team. The Gamecocks’ cohesion is based on connection and competition outside of the Division I grind.
But Candela also feels there would be a strong advantage in recruiting for the first SEC program to add an NCAA men’s lacrosse program — and he’d be glad to see it happen at South Carolina someday.
“I think what makes it successful is that we are a club right now,” Candela said. “Just like our culture, how the guys get to enjoy themselves and then play competitive lacrosse, so it’s just the icing on the cake. ... I think the biggest thing is always funding. That’s always the hurdle for everything, especially for bringing in new sports and stuff like that. But I would love to see an NCAA team here, whether I’m the coach here or not. I think that would be something that’d be awesome for the game and for the state.”
This story was originally published June 10, 2022 at 5:00 AM.
