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The moment that Megan Carney waited five years for started with a pass from Emma Tyrrell. Then, she pump-faked to free up space at the near post, shot and threw down her stick with uncontrollable excitement as SU led 13-12.

Carney’s game-winning goal ended SU’s five-year winless drought versus North Carolina and snapped the Tar Heels’ 41-game home winning streak.

“Obviously they’re the reigning national champs so it’s always fun to come back and get a win over them,” Syracuse goalkeeper Delaney Sweitzer said of UNC postgame.

Sweitzer put it lightly. For Carney, it was the first time she beat North Carolina in her career. Her final goal against the Tar Heels was one of a team-high 49 goals she’s scored this season as a fifth-year. She put in work over the offseason, recovering from an ACL tear in 2021, to lead Syracuse to a 15-1 regular-season record. Her career year has SU poised as one of the favorites to win it all, something it’s never done.

“This is our last chance to do it while we’re all still here, so it’s definitely been exciting so far,” Carney said.

Between all four graduate students — Carney, Meaghan Tyrrell, Sierra Cockerille and Tessa Queri — it was an unspoken rule that everyone would return. There was unfinished business. The obvious reason was to secure a national championship. But, it was also a last-ditch effort to play with all of them healthy. Carney and Cockerille suffered ACL tears in 2021 and 2022, respectively.

“It was so evident just how close of a relationship that they all had,” said Jack Potenza, Carney’s boyfriend. “As a competitor, it burned a hole in Meg not finishing the way she wanted to.”

Both of Carney’s parents encouraged her to return. Carney’s brother, AJ, recommended she stay because he joked “the real world isn’t a whole lot of fun.” And so, by the end of the 2022 campaign, Carney informed head coach Kayla Treanor that she’d be back.

For the bulk of the offseason, Carney stayed in San Diego, interning with Adrenaline Lacrosse, an up-and-coming lacrosse national event and apparel provider. From June until mid-August, she served as a brand ambassador, working in marketing. But, she needed to train as well. Through family on the West Coast, Carney got in contact with Bobby Congalton, a strength coach and movement specialist that she trained with previously. Congalton remembered thinking that if Carney came to his facility to train, it would “change her life.”

With Congalton, Carney’s goal was to find the underlying issues behind her limited abilities. She had lingering effects from an ACL tear in 2021 — a season where she had notched a career-best 69 points — that bothered her in 2022. Carney’s father, Drue, said the injury was “awful” and “miserable” for her.

“Just focusing a lot more on my lower body, trying to get stronger because I’ve had to battle a few injuries,” said Carney about her offseason regimen. “And, making myself more confident in general.”

Carney’s training was split into two sections. The first concentrated on feeling more comfortable by cleaning up her movement patterns through Dynamic Neuromuscular Stabilization (DNS).

DNS is a form of exercise that rewires the way people move by bringing them back to specific developmental positions, Congalton said. The exercises neurologically clean up how all muscles act around a specific joint. In Carney’s case, her knee injury connects to her foot and her hip, so the pair did detailed hip and foot exercises to relieve the pain. Congalton remembered times when he asked for Carney’s trust despite her explaining that she was told not to perform certain motions. From there, more “high-speed stuff” was introduced.

The second portion of Carney’s training focused on weight and velocity training. She worked on back squats, adding chains and bands for extra mass. She executed single leg lifts and lateral lunges, targeting the portions of her leg that were most uncomfortable. Congalton said Carney had the best squats and bench “of her life” last summer.

“To take a world class athlete, to push them, see them struggle and to see them flounder at times is important,” Congalton said. “She’s going to come out on the other side and she’s going to have the year that she’s having right now.”

Based on her schedule with Adrenaline, Carney’s workout times with Congalton varied. She held lacrosse lessons for younger players and had multiple clients a day. Occasionally, Carney started with a training session before her internship and then coached in the afternoon and night. Other times, it was the complete opposite. Regardless, Carney never missed a workout opportunity. She never has.

AJ said Carney was the exact same way in high school or on family vacations. No matter where they traveled, Carney forced AJ to bring his stick so they could find an open field and practice. “She wanted to be pushed as hard as possible all the time,” AJ said.

When Carney wasn’t working out, she studied film in Congalton’s gym, either by herself or with Potenza. Carney and Potenza watched old matchups and studied the X’s and O’s of women’s lacrosse.

“She loves what I love,” said Potenza, a former college lacrosse player at St. Lawrence. “We’ve grown so much because I’ve found so much interest in learning from her.”

In the beginning, Carney led the discussions. She’d explain opposing defenses to Potenza and dissect whether they were in a man or zone. Then, she’d tell him how Syracuse would attack and combat any adjustments. It was fascinating how everything Carney foretold the night before came to fruition in games, Potenza said.

This season, before SU’s home opener against Northwestern, Potenza used his newfound knowledge to challenge Carney. The two went back-and-forth, predicting the Wildcats’ game plan. Everytime Potenza posed a hypothetical concern, Carney countered with a foolproof answer. She ended up scoring a team-high four goals to defeat NU in a 16-15 thriller.

The “old Megan” returned this year, her parents said. She wasn’t playing with concern or fear as her lasting injuries had vanished. Syracuse’s offensive versatility and firepower didn’t need her to be a dual-threat anymore. This year, Carney registered a career-high 59% shot percentage and her goal tally has matched a personal best, including six goals against Stony Brook.

“To see her speed again, her power, it’s fun to watch,” said Carney’s mother, Kelly. “She took this fifth year, and to do it healthy is a huge blessing.”

Carney cradled the ball deep into UNC territory and dished to Cockerille as time expired on Syracuse’s 14-12 victory over North Carolina on Apr. 15. The Orange sideline erupted and rushed onto the field, ambushing their starters in a mixture of disbelief and bliss.

Somewhere in the crowd, Kelly started crying.

“This meant more than the national championship,” she said.

Published on April 26, 2023 at 12:16 am

Contact Tyler: trschiff@syr.edu | @theTylerSchiff