It was hard to imagine the game ending more perfectly for Laura Rotolo.
In the former Waltham High girls lacrosse star's first match back in her hometown as a member of the Southern New Hampshire women's team on Saturday, she scored four times - including the game-clinching goal with 3:10 left in the contest - as the Penmen earned the last cheer in an 18-15 battle at Bentley College. Perhaps most fittingly, the game ended with Rotolo picking up a loose ball off the Bentley turf with nine seconds left and running out the clock as she raced toward her personal cheering section at the far sideline.
``I invited everyone,'' said the SNHU junior. ``My whole family came. It is very hard to get my whole family up to New Hampshire. Usually, it is just my No. 1 fan - my mom - who comes, and sometimes my sister. Today, it was my day, my brother, my cousins. So I guess on that last play I tended to run toward them.''
Rotolo last played a lacrosse game in Waltham in the spring of 2005 as she and current Columbia University standout Holly Glynn led the Hawks to the state tournament and nearly a playoff upset of Acton-Boxboro.
Nearly three years later, she was back on her home turf Saturday having persevered down a long road to get there.
Waiting game
Rotolo's path to full-fledged Penmanship was not an easy one.
She chose to head to Manchester, N.H. to join the emerging program because she wanted to be a part of building something. Yet, when she arrived, she found out that her role in that process was going to have to be almost all behind the scenes her entire freshman season.
Because her S.A.T. scores did not meet the minimum requirements for a Division II athlete, she was informed that as a ``partial qualifier'' she could practice with the team her first year, but could not play in a game.
``I actually quit for a day,'' said Rotolo, adding that she was not aware of the restriction when she chose to attend the school. ``I was like: `I don't want to play if I can't be on the field.'''
She informed her new coach, inaugural SNHU coach Mary Squire, of her decision. Squire immediately asked her to reconsider.
``When I quit for a day,'' Rotolo recalled, ``she told me: `Laura, that's a bad decision. You are going to be a year behind when you come back.'''
Squire remembers the talk more bluntly.
``I told her that if she did that, I didn't think she would play (ever),'' the coach said.
So Rotolo spent that day - the one day since she was in middle school that she could not call herself a lacrosse player - contemplating that reality. She decided it was a reality she couldn't live with and became determined to deal with a year on the sideline in exchange for a renewed future in the sport.
``I thought about it,'' she said, ``and was like: `You know what? Never mind. I love lacrosse. I want to stick with it.'''
It wasn't always easy. She had to do the same work as all of her teammates without any of the rewards. She played fall ball, trained in the weight room, ran sprints and juggled her studies around the time commitment of a Division II varsity sport.
Yet not once did she ever have the hope that spring of getting in a box score or scoring a goal.
``It's all dirty work,'' Squire said. ``And she did it. And it's paid dividends for her. She chose to stick it out for a year, and practice, and work her butt off.''
When asked if players often stay with the team under those circumstances, Squire responded: ``No. It's very rare they do.''
``It was tough,'' Rotolo admitted, ``especially sitting here watching every single game. But I knew that I wanted to play. I love the sport, and I love my team. I figured I might as well start off from the beginning. So I stuck by it the whole year.''
``That's her story,'' Squire concluded, ``just working hard and getting better.''
Improving ground
Rotolo said one reason she put so much effort into the ``off'' year was so she would be ready to step right in when she became fully eligible as a sophomore.
Apparently, it worked as she was a key rotation attacker off the bench during her first year as the Penmen reached the Northeast-10 semifinals before losing to Bentley at Stonehill College.
``She got a couple of starts here and there last year,'' Squire said. ``But she was still really looking for her game. She had to get used to the pressure of being out on the field (at a collegiate pace).
``She has a great shot. But she needed time to find her space. Her gift is her shooting and her accuracy. But she needed to be able to do that under game pressure. That's where she had to grow and build up a little bit last year.''
This season that growth has been evident. As part of a SNHU team picked second in the NE-10 and 10th in the country this spring, Rotolo is the squad's fourth-leading scorer with eight goals and 11 points.
``I am moving my feet,'' she said of her development. ``Coaches yelled at me when I would catch it and just stand there working the goalie. Then I get checked and lose the ball. So I take what my coaches give me for advice. When I catch the ball, keep running and shoot low - move that goalie.''
On Saturday, she moved the Bentley netiminder twice early in the second half as the Penmen forged an 11-8 lead with 25 minutes to play. Then, with SNHU protecting a one-goal lead as the clock ticked toward three minutes, she saw an opening toward the goal and took it as she darted into the air and one-timed a pass from behind the net for the backbreaking tally.
It was the exact type of ``jump shot'' she converted dozens of times in a Hawk uniform and one that remains quintessentially Rotolo.
``I am still the shortest one on the team,'' she said of the move. ``So when they see me jump so high on those, and catch it, then drive it in like a slam dunk, basically, they want to know where that came from.
``I tell them: `White girl can jump. She really can.'''
While Squire described the shot as ``old habits that die hard,'' adding that she doesn't have any other players who do such a thing, she did laud Rotolo's new habit of seizing an opportunity to put the game away like that.
``She has a great sense of what the situations are now,'' the coach said. ``High school kids tend to just react. It's a very fast game for them when they get to college. But her game sense has gotten much better.
``Her lacrosse IQ - so to speak - has gone up tremendously. She gets things and she see things a lot better now.''
High hopes
The Penmen improved to 3-2 overall and 2-0 in the NE-10 with the important victory over Bentley Saturday. For a program that was 0-10 in Squire's first year in 2004, and 6-8 in 2005 when Rotolo chose to attend SHNU, the expectations are soaring.
``Taking the conference,'' Rotolo said of her goals this spring. ``No doubt.''
Rotolo gives much of the credit for the team's potential, and her own improvement, to Squire and was a voice in the coach's ear for parts of Saturday's second half when she was out of the game.
Her coach allowed that remains part of Rotolo's charm.
``Her attitude is great,'' Squire said. ``She has a passion for the game. She loves it and she is so positive.
``(That spirit) is infectious and it's good for the team.''
Rotolo couldn't contain that spirit in the final seconds of Saturday's contest when she saw the ball on the turf. Her family members couldn't contain their enthusiasm for her when she grabbed it and raced toward them as they jumped up and down and cheered for her.
It was the ideal way to cap off a triumphant return home.
The dedication it took to get back perhaps making it all the more rewarding.
