EASTHAMPTON — Sunday afternoons in the backyard shaped Meg Szawlowski as a lacrosse player and a person.
The five Szawlowski siblings gather on the weekends to spend time together and play the game that runs through their veins.
Their father, Michael, played football and lacrosse at American International College.
A son, Mike, and three daughters Ashleigh, Bridget and Courtney also put on the Yellow Jackets’ black and gold on the lacrosse field.
The practices at their Leeds home produced opportunities for competition and instruction.
Not all of the lessons were spoken or overt.
“Ever since I was little I was having balls thrown at my head,” said Meg, who grew up around the game of lacrosse and the culture of sports.
She watched her family members play practically from birth and emulated them at the earliest possible date.
“She’d be running up and down the sidelines with her little lacrosse stick at all of our games. She was pretty much two days old in a gym,” Ashleigh said. “She’s been around all of our sports all of her life at all of our games.”
Meg’s game eventually took after Courtney’s. She is AIC’s all-time leading scorer and dished out the most assists in program history.
“She plays a lot like Courtney did, just the style in which they play and how they control the movement of the attack,” Ashleigh said. “Courtney took the draw in college and in high school, Meg does the same thing. She’s always been the baby, and we live through her now.”
Ashleigh didn’t finish far behind Courtney on AIC’s all-time scoring list. They both attended UMass initially before transferring to play alongside Bridget in Springfield.
Before college, all three made their mark on Northampton High School’s program.
Meg chose another route.
Rather than donning the Blue Devils’ shade, she picked the Williston Northampton Wildcats’ blue and green.
“I wanted to push myself academically and athletically,” Meg said. “I knew that if I came here I would be pushed out of my comfort zone. That’s what I’m all about.”
She leads Williston in scoring and assists during her senior season, her fourth as a Wildcat.
Her sisters have witnessed the improvement from year to year and game to game.
“She feels like she needs to be better. She gets better. Every time we watch her play she improves,” Ashleigh said. “In her offseason she really pushed it in the weight room and really worked on her speed in the winter. Even last year to this year there’s really a difference with her speed.”
Meg will arrive early or stay late to help teammates improve. She’ll work with them on skills, take 100 extra shots and spend time working on her off hand.
“I don’t even think she knows how talented she is. It’s always been about the team for her. She will share the ball, she’ll set things up. She doesn’t care about the spotlight being on her. She just wants her team to be successful, but she is gutsy,” Williston coach Jennifer Fulcher said. “She scores the big goals. She’s had the big assists. She takes all the big draws.”
Fulcher has watched Meg develop since she joined the Williston program.
“She has grown in her lacrosse IQ, her ability to read the game, her ability to read the team, the situation, her ability to score,” Fulcher said. “The confidence that she has to want the ball in her stick in big situations and her ability to not only be one of the best kids on the field at all times, but the ability to make everyone around her better. Everyone that plays with Swaz is better for it as a person and player.”
Those qualities stuck out to Central Connecticut State coach Tanya Kotowicz, who just completed her second season and initially scrambled to fill recruiting classes.
“The coaches prior hadn’t done much. We were playing catch up,” Kotowicz said. “There were a couple kids that were still around. We went pretty hard at all of them.”
Meg responded to the Blue Devils’ overtures, again choosing her own path to Division I lacrosse.
“My two sisters played at UMass, originally, first. I was going to go there, but this school came along, Central Connecticut State, and it’s a perfect fit for me,” Meg said. “It’s somewhere I think I can make an impact and where I want to go and where I’ll stand out.”
Kotowicz is counting on Meg to contribute when she arrives.
“We look for workers, kids that are willing to get her knuckles dirty, kids that have a fire underneath her. Meg was one of those kids. To be honest, she’s a program changer for us,” Kotowicz said. “I honestly think she has the potential to be one of the best players in the NEC. It’s always up to the athlete. She has the tools, and we’re going to give her everything she needs.”
For now, though, Meg still has six regular season games and a likely postseason run left for the Wildcats (9-1).
She’ll likely be the focus of the defense and her own criticism should the Wildcats falter.
“She’s almost too hard on herself. She’s a perfectionist,” Courtney said. “If she makes a mistake, she gets kind of mad at herself.”
“We were all brought up with tough love, and she gets it from all of us now. We have to set her in her ways and say ‘it happens,’” Ashleigh said. “We’ve been there. She’s still really hard on herself. Whether she listens to us or not, we’re there to help her.”
Kyle Grabowski can be reached at kgrabowski@gazettenet.com.