Our culture is full of great returns.

Tolkien’s “The Return of the King” comes to mind, and Lucas’ Jedi, to name but two.

The Bainbridge High boys varsity lacrosse team managed their own great return earlier this week when, unfazed by a dispiriting season debut shellacking at the hands of Bellevue (9-6 on Friday, March 13), they returned to their home field and emerged triumphant over Seattle Preparatory Tuesday.

The Spartans scored first and led throughout the contest, cinching the 7-5 win.

Goals were scored by Ben Biggers (one), Jack Frickelton (two), Ben Laroche (two) and Max Wickline (two).

The predominately junior squad (which boasts only six seniors this year) played well all around, but failed to capitalize on a lot of opportunities in the first half of the game, said Spartan Co-Head Coach Cody Bludorn.

“I thought we could have taken care of the ball a little bit more [and] helped our defense out,” he explained.

Everyone on the field needs to be paying attention all the time, he added.

Attention from off the field, however, is not something that the Spartan defense has been wanting for so far this season, and BHS’ primary goalie, freshman phenomenon Charlie Shrout, is already making a name for himself as a key member of the squad’s starting lineup.

Shrout achieved a 50 percent save ratio in the team’s first outing, in which he played the entire 48 minutes, managing nine for 18 shots. Then again against Prep the fresh-faced freshman claimed a nearly 67 percent save rate, blocking 10 out of 15 shots.

“He played great today,” Bludorn said Tuesday. “We’re fortunate enough to have a hole and an opportunity for him, and he stepped in nicely for us.”

“That’s a tough position to start as a freshman in and he’s done a good job,” Bludorn added.

In front of the net, the Spartan squad is a mixture of seasoned vets and new faces.

The seniors are Ben Fisher, Laroche, Zach Morales, Casey Pabst, Mike Rose and Wickline.

“We hope they can come in with a little more maturity and lead the younger kids and uphold the same tradition that we expect year-to-year,” Bludorn said of this season’s senior players.

Leadership is certainly not lacking for the Spartans, on or off the field, and amongst a returning staff of dedicated assistant coaches the team is led by the team captain trio of Laroche, Morales and Wickline.

“We might end up with five captains,” Bludorn laughed. “We’re still looking for that leadership from guys — no matter if they’re a sophomore all the way through seniors — we’re just looking for leadership out on the field.”

While they might still be working out the kinks in their technical prowess, the current Spartan squad boasts gung-ho attitude to spare, Bludorn said, adding that “eagerness” was definitely the adjective that best describes this year’s squad.

“They’re making a lot of mistakes early in the season but [there’s] a lot of potential as well,” he explained. “We just need to, with the coaching staff, motivate them and kind of push the right buttons in practice and kind of motivate them to, on the game day, come out with their full potential.”

Leadership? Check. Eagerness? Check. Talent? Check. Killer instinct? Well, we’ll see.

Throughout both of the season’s first games, Bludorn said, the team was not taking enough shots, a tactical deficit in need of speedy adjustment.

“We haven’t had enough time to really work with each other this early in the season,” he explained. “It’s nice to get out and play against other competition, but if we’re not playing the right way then we’d almost rather be practicing.”

The second half was better overall, he said Tuesday, and the next game will undoubtedly be better still as the team begins to mesh and find their rhythms.

“We’ve got to improve every game,” he said. “After each game that we go through we have certain points that we really try to emphasize. [Tuesday] was taking care of the ball. I thought we did a little bit better job in the second half after stressing it because we couldn’t maintain possession as long as we wanted to.”

The Spartans had one more consecutive chance to play at home Thursday against Eastlake (results were unavailable when the Review went to press) before hitting the road for the next two games in a row, beginning with a 5 p.m. face-off Saturday, March 21 against Seattle Academy at Shoreline Stadium.

BHS will play at Battle Point Park at 5:15 p.m. Wednesday, March 25 against Kennedy Catholic, and then back at home again at 6 p.m. Friday, March 27 against Centennial.