Former Columbus North lacrosse players Liberty Jones, left, and Rylie Boezeman pose for a photo at the Richard Wigh Soccer Complex in Columbus, Ind., Thursday, July 13, 2023.
Mike Wolanin | The Republic
When the COVID-19 pandemic shutdown occurred in 2020, it gave Liberty Jones the time and opportunity to reassess a sport she enjoyed in her youth.
At the end of her freshman year, Jones reignited the fire and passion she had in lacrosse by forming the Columbus girls lacrosse team. The team had its first season in 2021 with much better results than anticipated. At the end of this past season, the team finished with a perfect 13-0 season in only its third year of competition.
Jones and teammate Rylie Boezeman have been the top two players for the Columbus lacrosse team the past three seasons. The duo recently graduated from Columbus North, but their lacrosse careers didn’t. They both will be playing in college next year, with Jones playing at Tusculum and Boezeman playing at Marian.
Boezeman was one of the first girls Jones contacted to see if she was interested in trying the sport. Boezeman didn’t hesitate and seized advantage of the opportunity.
“She reached out to me about it,” Boezeman recalled. “She was trying to recruit some girls, too, to start playing. I didn’t have a spring sport that was super demanding of my time, so she reached out if I was interested in playing, and I said, ‘Yes,’ and we took it from there. I was pretty grateful and amazing for that.”
Jones began her lacrosse journey when she saw it on the MTV show “Teen Wolf,” and it intrigued her. She found out there was a team locally, and in the sixth grade, was playing on the boys team called the Columbus Cyclones, which was run by Andrew Jerman. After she played that for a couple years, Jones took a hiatus from lacrosse and continued with playing basketball when she started high school. Unfortunately, she tore her ACL her freshman season.
It was devastating for Jones, but it may have also been a blessing in disguise. With plenty of time to spare rehabbing, coupled with the COVID shutdown, Jones, with the help of her family, started making social media posts and getting the word out of a potential girls lacrosse team.
The response was enough to hit the ground running. Jones received numerous texts and calls about trying out and asking questions about it. She eventually held a meeting at Parkside Elementary a couple times teaching new girls about the sport and the rules until a coach was found. They began the first practices as a team at the PAAL fields. The rest was history.
“I definitely had some doubts going into starting the team. I had a vision that even though if we had lost every single game, we were getting girls interested and getting the sport well spread and interested throughout the city of Columbus,” Jones said. “As the years have gone on, we won more and more games. Even our first season, I feel like we won a chunk of the games we played in. This past year, we’d gone undefeated, and I never would have dreamed of that, so being able to pull through and have the undefeated season was such an accomplishment.”
Boezeman always had an interest in lacrosse when she was younger, and watching her brother Trenton play lacrosse only piqued her interest further. Since they didn’t have a girls program at the time, she played other sports. She played for the Columbus Express Soccer Club, recreation softball and flag football.
Lacrosse player Rylie Boezeman poses for a photo at the Richard Wigh Soccer Complex in Columbus, Ind., Thursday, July 13, 2023.
Mike Wolanin | The Republic
Boezeman’s two biggest sports when she got to high school were basketball and volleyball. She played volleyball at Foundation for Youth when she was in second grade and then the Columbus East Volleyball Club starting in fourth grade. For basketball, she started out playing for the Columbus Comets travel team, then the Indiana Flight when she was in high school.
After the girls lacrosse team was formed, Boezeman gave it a shot and found instant success. She fell in love with it so much that after her sophomore year, she shifted her focus from basketball to lacrosse as her main sport.
“It felt very natural to me,” Boezeman said. “I’ve been a multisport athlete for basically my entire life, and lacrosse really combined elements from my other sports like basketball and soccer and volleyball. I was able to see different aspects from those sports coming together into lacrosse, and I felt very strong and secure and in my position in lacrosse. It just felt right, and I felt like I wanted to pursue that as my main sport.”
According to a study conducted by the NCAA in 2018, no sport has experienced greater growth than men’s and women’s lacrosse. The number of women’s lacrosse teams nearly doubled between 2003 and 2018, rising 97% from 256 to 505, while men’s lacrosse experienced a 61% increase over the 15-year time period, fielding 380 teams by 2018.
Lacrosse player Liberty Jones poses for a photo at the Richard Wigh Soccer Complex in Columbus, Ind., Thursday, July 13, 2023.
Mike Wolanin | The Republic
In addition to playing high school lacrosse, Jones also played in club. She started playing for Circle City, which is based in Indianapolis, in 2021, then she spent the past two years with Indy United.
Jones now is looking forward to playing lacrosse at Tusculum. She initially was approached by Pioneer head coach Jenna Agostino, who invited Jones to a recruiting process, which Jones described as similar to going to a camp.
While at Tusculum, Jones plans to study behavioral health psychology.
“I had gone to that, and I had seen the school,” Jones said. “Actually, one of my Indy United coaches had played for the rival team in Tennessee, and she had told me that this is a really good school, and you should really look into it, and I did. Ever since then, I have been super interested and fell in love with the school and the team.”
Boezeman researched many lacrosse programs. She factored in many things, including school size, distance and reputation. Ultimately, she settled on Marian. She will major in biology and minor in global studies in hopes of landing a career in the health field, possibly becoming a physician’s assistant.
Boezeman is excited about the next chapter in her lacrosse career for the Knights.
“I’m just over the moon about it,” Boezeman said. “We had a fantastic season last year, and I think we are on the upswing. We’ve got a great coaching staff, the girls are great and we actually have a couple of returning seniors taking their COVID year. We have plenty of experience, and the girls have a whole bunch of fire behind them, so I think it’s going to be a great year, and I’m really looking forward to it.”
Like Boezeman, Jones is also thrilled to begin her collegiate career as a lacrosse player.
“I’m very excited,” Jones said. “We definitely have already started that training, so the transition from high school to college is going to be a big change. I’m really looking forward to being able to change the atmosphere and getting to know a new team and working level my level in lacrosse IQ.”
