The Register Citizen (Torrington, CT)
What’s next for Hammerheads following a productive draft?
It was quite the eventful week in the professional lacrosse world.
On Monday, Major League Lacrosse held its college draft and on Wednesday the Premier Lacrosse League announced a 20game tournament held without fans from July 25-Aug. 9 to replace the 2020 season.
The PLL tournament will be televised on NBC Sports Network as will the two-round, 14-player college draft on Wednesday. Once that draft is held and MLL teams can have a better idea of which of their draftees will be signing with the MLL.
“Guys are excited for a future whenever that is,” Connecticut Hammerheads coach Bill Warder said. “I am not sure when that is going to be, that is out of all of our hands.”
Warder, the 2018 MLL Coach of the Year, worked with much of the Hammerheads roster when the franchise was located in Dallas. He has been in contact with the veteran players through email and Zoom video conference calls.
“Players are probably zoomed out at this point,” Warder said with a laugh. “I sent an email over the weekend to our current players to give them another [reminder] of the style of play we play demands pretty extreme fitness from a cardio standpoint so I don’t know if it is running in place, jumping rope or if you aren’t going outside running with all the correct procedures that are recommended by all the health organizations, that limits what you can do from a fitness standpoint. Nobody is going to the gym and racking plates on the squat bar so guys are trying to be creative on how they
can stay ultra fit.”
The Hammerheads do have former Yale stars Chris Keating and Robert Mooney and Sacred Heart’s Landon Kramer on the roster and then added a host of players with ties to Connecticut in the MLL College Draft with New Canaan’s Michael Kraus and Brandon Salvatore, Wilton’s Michael Brown and former Yale standouts Aidan Hynes and Will Renz selected with six of the team’s top seven picks.
“Any time you can have the knowledge of players whether it is high school teams or club teams, there are territorial pockets across the country,” Warder said. “Whether it is in the Boston area, Chesapeake, Connecticut or upstate New York, those teams have always tried to pick guys who can be in that market, can spread the name of the team and get positive energy from it.”
The Hammerheads announced Jeremy Boltus and Fairfield University assistant coach Craig Gibson were named to Warder’s coaching staff.
The Hammerheads can now only wait until the PLL Draft to see if any of the players they selected will be picked by the rival league. The move of selecting so many players with Connecticut ties could work in the Hammerheads’ favor. Kraus would certainly be at the top of that list as he joins Charlie Bertrand as the only players taken by the Hammerheads listed among the top 10 players for the PLL draft. Bertrand has said he plans on returning to Merrimack for the 2021 season. The Hammerheads will retain his rights through the 2021 MLL draft.
“I don’t think I will make a decision right away but see what the options are and go from there,” Kraus said shortly after he was drafted.
EVANCHICK SIGNS
Darien’s Mark Evanchick became one of the first MLL draftees to sign his contract when he agreed to terms with the Philadelphia Barrage.
Evanchick, the No. 8 overall pick, was a threeyear starter at Penn who was a captain of the football and lacrosse teams at Darien who was the 2015 New Haven Register State Player of the Year in football who ended his career as the state’s career sack leader.