Hopkinton Lax Star Chandler Not Done Making Her Mark
Monday, February 04, 2013
Tess Chandler had 83 goals last season. (Credit: John Copley)
A starting varsity midfielder since her freshman year, Chandler had a sensational junior season last spring, totaling 83 goals and 32 assists for 115 points. She became the first player in Hopkinton history to score her 200th career goal as a junior. If that wasn’t enough, Chandler also led the Hillers in draw controls and forced turnovers.
In November, Chandler signed a national letter of intent to play at Boston College this fall. But instead of trumping up the event, she displayed the modesty that Hopkinton coach Jodi Dolan has come to expect from her 6-foot star, whom Dolan first coached when Chandler was in third grade.
“You’d never know how good she was just by talking to her or the way she acts off the field,” Dolan said. “She doesn’t brag about herself or anything like that. She didn’t like to talk about committing early to BC. She was really quiet about it. I was like, ‘Put it in the paper when you sign your national letter of intent!’ She said, ‘No, I don’t want to do that.’ Normally kids will blast it with a big picture. She said, ‘No, that’s OK.’ She’s kind of quiet and shy about those kinds of things.
“When she gets on the field, though, the spotlight’s on her and she does very well under pressure. She loves to win. She will do anything. She’s very competitive and does not like to lose.”
Chandler gets plenty of opportunities to feed that competitive fire. She is a three-sport athlete who plays basketball and volleyball along with lacrosse. Dolan thinks Chandler could play at the Division I level in any of the three sports.
Chandler will attend Boston College this fall.
“In the indoor league, she looks like a woman playing with children – not only because of her size, but just her skills,” said Dolan. “She can do anything she wants out there.
“We have a team photographer, and I’ll look at some of the pictures of the things she’s doing in the air, like Michael Jordan, and I don’t know she can do the things that she does. She’s just a really gifted athlete. She’s tough, too. For someone who’s tall, you’d be surprised how fast she can get down the field for a tall girl. She doesn’t play like a tall girl.”
What does Chandler have in store for her senior season? A further assault on the Hopkinton record books sounds about right.
“She will certainly break every school record that we have for scoring and assists,” Dolan said. “She has every accolade you could ever imagine as a lacrosse player.”
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