Albany's Connor Fields Played The Last Two Seasons On A Torn ACL. Not A Big Deal Or Anything
If you were following along with the college lacrosse season, you’d have known that Connor Fields was clearly playing on a torn ACL the past month of the season. He first went down this season with a sprained ACL in a game against Harvard near the end of May. He missed two games with that, came back and ended up re-injuring his knee against Yale in April. It was a non-contact injury which typically means it’s something with the ACL. But Connor Fields continued to play on that knee. He finished out the regular season. Missed the American East Championship game against Vermont. Put up 7 points in Albany’s first round win over Richmond. Had 3 assists in Albany’s quarterfinal win over Denver. And then put up 2 goals and 5 points in Albany’s semifinal loss to Yale. It was his senior year and Albany had a goal of winning a National Championship, so Albany let him finish out the year and kept the diagnosis under wraps for the last month. But everybody had been expecting the news about at least a sprained ACL to come out as soon as Albany’s season was over. The actual diagnosis, however? Well holy shit…
So not only did Connor Fields play the last month of the season on a torn ACL, but this kid has been playing the past two years on a torn ACL. Which is pretty goddamn incredible on it’s own. But this shit is beyond human when you combine the fact that Connor Fields played 2 seasons on a torn ACL and still managed to become the 2nd all-time career points leader in NCAA DI Men’s Lacrosse history. The only player in the history of the game to have more points than Connor Fields in his career was Lyle Thompson. Think about how many players have come through this game. Think about all of the legends. The Powells, the Gaits, Pannell, Danowski, Rabil, etc. Connor Fields put up more points than all of them in his career and he did it with a torn ACL for half of his career.
He had 117 points alone last year in his junior year. He put up another 86 this year which means that this animal had over 200 career points on a busted knee. Plus he’s been playing some high level box in the summers. Which just goes to prove the point that the comment section on my lacrosse blogs are filled with some of the biggest goddamn morons the internet has to offer. Literally the dumbest people on the planet. Every single one of you bozos who come here to immediately rip on the sport, saying some dumb shit like it’s for people who are too unathletic to play other sports. Saying something like lax is for guys who got cut from their JV baseball team. You people kidding me? Pitchers in baseball throw a ball a few times one day and then they can’t even look at a ball for the next 5 days. I’ve literally seen baseball guys miss games before because they sneezed too hard and threw out their back. Meanwhile Connor Fields was playing lacrosse on a torn ACL for 2 full seasons. And not only was he playing on torn ACLs, but he was playing at the highest level. So yeah, you can all beat it.
But this blog isn’t about you morons. It’s about Connor Fields. It’s about the drive and the dedication it takes to keep competing even when your body is falling apart. You could tell he wasn’t the same player we know him to be during the last few weeks of the season. But he kept battling anyway, put up 15 points in 3 NCAA Tournament games and took Albany to their first Championship Weekend appearance in program history. An absolute stud and it just sucks his time in college lacrosse is over.