New coach hoping to get Nashua South girls lacrosse headed in new direction

Meg Ackerman knows it’s possible for the Nashua High School South girls lacrosse team to find success.

The Panthers’ first-year coach graduated from South in 2006 and was a member of a team that reached the Division I championship game. A year later, South was not only back in the title game, but won it.

But Ackerman also knows where the program stands now. She stayed closed while her younger sister, Caitlyn, played for South before graduating last spring. Ackerman knows she inherited a team that won just one game a season ago, and hasn’t had enough players to field a junior varsity team the last few years.

“Numbers are low, but it’s a big building year,” she said. “There’s seven girls who have never played lacrosse before. The last three weeks, they’ve shown a strong camaraderie and really come together. It’s a group of very talented athletes, but a very young team. It will come down to the fundamentals and we’ll get there.”

With the season starting this week, the Panthers were finally able to consistently get the experience of going against another team. That’s something that Ackerman hasn’t been able to do in practice because of the low numbers.

“We don’t even have enough girls that we can have a full scrimmage at our practices,” she said. “It’s good for them. When we do see teams a second time around, we’ll be a different team. We’ll be a different team in two weeks and three weeks and as the season goes on.”

South didn’t get any help from its schedule, having to open the season with back-to-back games against Souhegan and Hollis Brookline. The Panthers fell to the Sabers and the Cavaliers by a combined 37-5

And it doesn’t get any easier, as South will head to Exeter on Friday. The Blue Hawks defeated Pinkerton on Monday.

“Those are three very strong teams in our division,” Ackerman said.

While the Panthers are made up of mostly freshmen and sophomores, Ackerman does have what she feels is a strong group of upperclassmen, including captains Summyr Burton, San Pham and Kelly McIntyre, each of whom scored a goal against HB, along with junior captain Colleen Rottman.

“Colleen is doing a great job in goal,” Ackerman said. “She has a great sense of the lacrosse field.”

And when the season is done, she plans to do whatever she can to increase the number of girls who would potentially play lacrosse at South.

“I’m hoping to grow the program a little bit and reach out to the Nashua Blast and get girls to play high school in the future,” she said.

Ackerman knows the girls are out there. All she had to do was look at the game after South’s Tuesday, when Nashua North’s second junior varsity team took on HB’s junior varsity.

“They have a full varsity, JV and a third team,” Ackerman said of North. “We don’t have enough members for a JV team and a varsity team. It’s good for the younger players to suit up for the varsity and get to watch and learn.”