Alex Loveland was a standout attack on the ADVNC SF & NDP ‘22 squad committed to play lacrosse at High Point University this coming Fall.
Alex moved to the Bay Area when he was three years old. His new neighbor was involved in the Firehawks lacrosse program, and had a son Alex’s age. The two of them introduced Alex to lacrosse.
Alex Loveland played on the Firehawks when he was young.
“I really liked lacrosse from the start,” said Alex. “Liked the creativity of the game and how I was free to run wherever I wanted. There wasn’t a ton of structure to the game. I played a lot of soccer as a kid too. I dreamed of playing pro soccer, but my passion soon shifted to lacrosse.”
“He got so emotionally invested in the lacrosse games from an early age,” said Alex’s mom, Tricia Loveland. “He would be very hard on himself if he didn’t play well or if his team didn’t win. He had to unlearn a lot of that, but he was just so invested in lacrosse really early on.”
After playing on the Firehawks for several years, Alex tried out for ADVNC before his 5th grade year. “I tried out as a short stick,” said Alex. “But when I got to the tryout, the coach pulled me aside and said I should try using a pole cause I was one of the bigger kids. So he threw me into drills with a long stick and the other kids were quickly teaching me the ropes. I made my first ADVNC team as a defender.”
“He was a truck!,” Alex’s dad, Mark Loveland fondly remembered.
Alex and his ADVNC ‘22 teammates in the “early” days.
“The kids were insanely better with ADVNC than what I was used to,” said Alex. “I remember how detail oriented ADVNC coaches were compared to my local team at practices. We had a lot of really good kids all together, so we could focus more on slide packages and things like that. It felt more like a tactical game being installed.”
“A big part of ADVNC was helping Alex with the mental side of the game,” said Mark Loveland. “The ADVNC coaches helped him get tougher on that level. It wasn’t just skills and fitness, but the totality of the game, and that helped Alex keep moving forward.”
Alex is a standout attack at Serra High.
In addition to the field game with ADVNC and at Serra High School, Alex has played box lacrosse for a long time. “Some of my friends had played a lot of box and I just wanted to play with them,” Alex said. “The first time I played, we had a training camp and then went up to Canada for a tournament. It was a cool experience to see a new side of lacrosse and I loved learning a new aspect of it.”
“Playing box was when I noticed Alex’s interest in lacrosse go up another level,” said Tricia Loveland. “Box was faster and smaller with more focus on passing and being aggressive in a different way. He rose quickly in box and brought that back to the field game. His field game improved because of box.”
“I went from defense to midfield and then went to FOGO,” said Alex. “But eventually I wanted to score goals. Box helped my offensive skill set. I really liked the creativity of box and I liked scoring goals. Box really got my game rolling and that’s when I started really wanting to play in college and I started working a lot harder on my game.”
Before the college recruiting process started, Alex was making his own highlight videos along with close friend and ADVNC ‘22 teammate, Max Sloat. “He started doing his own videos around 8th grade so I just assumed you had to make your own. I learned how to edit and it was a lot of fun.”
Loveland started with ADVNC playing DPole.
Eventually, the college recruiting process began for Alex. “It was a weird rollercoaster,” said Alex. “There was a lot of work to do. A lot of editing highlight videos and sending emails to coaches. My recruitment was during covid quarantine. So that was weird. I’d play in showcases and tournaments with no coaches on the sideline, but I knew they were watching online, I just didn’t know who was watching. It was a mystery and I just had to have some faith.”
Shortly thereafter, Alex heard from a coach that piqued his interest. “I got an email from Coach Torpey at High Point. I hadn’t heard a lot about the school, but when I did my research it was an interesting school,” said Alex. “The campus was insane, and it was just an interesting new thing and it all rolled pretty quickly.”
“That’s when we really relied on Coach Coach Rotelli (ADVNC Founder & CEO) and Coach Tyler Kreitz (Former ADVNC COO and Alex’s Coach at Serra),” said Tricia Loveland. “They talked to Coach Torpey on Alex’s behalf and also gave him feedback about Alex. They encouraged us to look more into the school and that was all really helpful.”
“Coach Rotelli and Kreitz were good at keeping Alex grounded,” said Mark Loveland. “It’s hard to be in California, talking to a dozen schools on the East Coast and have a real good sense of which schools are realistic. They kept Alex focused and grounded and recognized that High Point would be a good fit, not just for lacrosse, but also as a school to spend four years at.”
Loveland was a key member of the ADVNC ‘22 NDP team.
“When I met Coach Torpey, I could tell his passion for the game, the passion he has for High Point and for the players in his program,” said Alex. “I spoke with (former ADVNC FOGO) Joey Dahlkemper and I could feel right away the intensity of the program and how special it is to be a part of that. The passion is what drew me into it.”
“Coach Torpey is serious about lacrosse, but he is very serious about the opportunity his players get after lacrosse too,” Alex said. “I personally want to study business and he is so invested in helping his players outside of lacrosse and helping them build their career. He cares as much for his players as a person as he does as an athlete. That stood out a lot.”
Looking back at her son’s ADVNC experience, Tricia Loveland said, “The other kids Alex played with on ADVNC are his best friends. The entire ADVNC community became our other family. We spent so much time together traveling, being on the East Coast, and being in hotels. It was very helpful to have Alex love these other boys. It made playing together more fun and they played better individually and as a team because of it.”