State champ MICDS could count on Willy Carpenter: All-Metro boys lacrosse player of the year

MICDS boys lacrosse coach Andy Kay knew he could count on recently graduated captain Willy Carpenter for anything.

“We have kindergartners out there every Thursday night. If we needed a body, Willy was out there,” Kay said. “He’s everywhere. We tap him to do speeches for our school community and we try to put him in front of anyone and everyone we can. He’s a great front door to the school.”

Carpenter was an impressive man of many talents at MICDS.

Senior class president. Captain and starting middle linebacker for the Rams’ football team. Two-time captain in lacrosse. Academic All-American.

All that, plus his immense talent on the field that helped lead MICDS back to the top of the state lacrosse heap helped Carpenter earn All-Metro boys lacrosse player of the year honors this season.

“I told my team at the beginning of the year during my captain’s speech that I don’t like the title captain,” he said. “I believe it almost puts that individual above the rest of the team. I told them I didn’t want them to look at me as a captain. I wanted them to look at me and treat me like their big brother. It wasn’t about me. It was about the team.”

The Rams won eight consecutive state championships from 2014-2022 but fell short in the state final during Carpenter’s junior campaign to break the run.

It was a blessing in disguise, he said.

MICDS compiled a 17-5 season this spring that included a Class 2 championship win over SLUH. The Rams’ campaign included nary a loss to a team from Missouri.

“I said it to my team at the beginning of the year, ‘Last year bites. It was a real shame. But I want all of you to recognize that it was the best thing that could happen for our team and our program,’ ” Carpenter said. “I think the best thing about losing my junior year — and why I truly believe that we won this year — is for the first time in a while it really allowed the MICDS men’s lacrosse team to be a family. It wasn’t about the people that weren’t on the team anymore. It was about the guys around you at practice.”

Carpenter was once again a key cog in the Rams’ success this spring. The all-state midfielder tallied a team-high 57 goals, along with 21 assists, for 78 points. His goal and assist totals both ranked sixth in the area.

“His athlete matrix would look really high-level in any of the football combines around here,” Kay said. “He is strong, and he is fast, and he has just great agility. I think those three things gave us a level of toughness in between the lines that we just didn’t have last year.”

Carpenter’s roots in the MICDS program run deep. He’s been around it since the age of four when his older brother, Henry, joined in fourth grade.

Willy had no doubt he wanted to follow in the footsteps of his brother, who played at Penn State.

“As I aged, I was able to watch my brother go through and watch his experience, so I knew that lacrosse was the thing I wanted to do,” he said. “For me, my brother has always been my hero. So to see him go forth in such a terrific way through the avenue of lacrosse made me confident that I wanted to do something similar.”

Henry was there for Willy again this spring when he needed him the most while trying to nail down the state title.

“I think probably one of most special things was that Henry took some time to come down here during our playoff run and was in our practices the week leading up to the championship game,” Kay said. “He knew Willy losing in the state championship game as a junior captain would be really impactful on him. Watching the relationship between Willy and his brother develop over the course of the past year, helping him recognize how special of a place MICDS is, I think that helped Willy kind of re-establish the work ethic within our locker room that was going to be needed to go out and win a state championship game this year.”

Carpenter will continue to play lacrosse at the next level when he suits up for Division III powerhouse Washington and Lee, which is located in Lexington, Va.

“It seems like a special place, but more than anything, I’m excited to sort of set myself up in that I-95 corridor on the East Coast where lacrosse truly is the No. 1 thing,” Carpenter said. “To take my skillset and go test myself across the country where competent players are the standard, I think it’s gonna be a really good opportunity for myself to just learn and grow as a player.”

Kay feels strongly that the player he and his team could count on for anything made a terrific choice for his future.

“I don’t know how many people here know what Washington and Lee is, but it’s got a nine percent acceptance rate. They are extremely competitive,” Kay said. “I think Willy very wisely made a choice to think about what his next four years were gonna look like for his college experience. A lot of kids get hung up on Division I, Division I, but I think Willy choosing an extremely high academic Division III school — that also by the way was in the national semifinals this year — was the kind of choice that I would expect a guy like Willy to make.”