When Mikey Sisselberger walks out onto the field, all he sees is the ball.
All the noise and chaos and movement around him and it all comes down to a ball, sitting there for him to take.
“I like to not focus on anything around me besides the ball,” the Lehigh face-off star says. “They put the ball down before anything. That’s a great focal point there. You’re not focused on anything around you, the ball’s already set on the ground and you have to line up on it.
“I look right at the ball, don’t focus on anything else, get down in my stance and think to myself, ‘be the quicker guy.’ … I’m just thinking, it’s my ball. You have to get the ball before you can do anything afterwards.”
Lehigh coach Kevin Cassese said that this year, Cole Kirst’s mentality is different.
“Every time he has the ball, he thinks he can score,” Cassese said.
Good thing it ended up in his stick with two minutes left and the game tied Saturday. He bombed an outside shot that inadvertently hopped into his crosse, then the Hawks’ defense held off a late Army surge for a 13-12 win.
Lehigh remains unbeaten at 5-0.
Michael Sisselberger was dominant yet again, winning 23-of-27 face-offs. He’s taken the reins as Lehigh’s primary drawman and has put himself in the discussion as best in the country.
Andrew Eichelberger’s recruiting visit to Lehigh back in 2014 seems oddly prescient now. When the Texas native came to Bethlehem, a snowstorm delayed the Mountain Hawks’ game, so he had to wait an extra day.
He clearly remembers the Kurtis Kaunas’ bouncer that won the game in triple-overtime, but it was his experience off the field that sealed the deal.
“The experience with the guys off the field was just as great. All the parents were super inviting and accepting of me and my dad,” he says. “I found my second family out here.”
Flash forward to early February 2021, and Eichelberger’s still in Bethlehem as a grad student, and he’s taken on the role of the inviting, mentoring figure to young players.