After playing lacrosse at Springside School in Philadelphia in seventh and eighth grade, Leslie Blankin Lane instead played tennis in the spring of her freshman year.

“We had an undefeated season on the tennis court, but it was the most unfun season I’ve ever had,” Lane said. “I played doubles, and the girl who was my partner was a senior and I ended up tracking everything down. She was a very nice person, but not fun to play with, so I jumped back into lacrosse and the rest is history.”

Pretty special history. Whomever Lane played with made history.

Lane, who also excelled at field hockey and basketball, thrived on the lacrosse field under Springside head coach Ann Morton. Though Lane had considered trying to go to the University of Virginia, where her father, Grant, had played basketball, she followed a neighbor’s advice and went to a smaller Virginia school, Hollins University.

“I have no regrets,” Lane said. “We beat UVA when I was playing at Hollins, so I have no regrets.”

Twice in four tries, Hollins upended Virginia and a third time they tied. Behind Lane, a natural attacker who played center midfield for the Green and Gold, Hollins won its first Virginia State Division II title in 1979 and were United States Women’s Lacrosse Association’s collegiate runner-ups. It was no disadvantage to go to a smaller school in the late 1970s.

“Even though Title IX had passed, the part of it where schools realized they had to make the women’s teams as equal as the men’s hadn’t quite evolved yet,” Lane said. “We had players who had played lacrosse in high school, had excellent coaching from the Philadelphia area, Baltimore area, Charlottesville area, and then you added some good athletes that you could teach how to play like Sandra Garrison, who came from North Carolina and she was a basketball player. She was a great defensive wing and could run all day. You add those athletes together and we just had a good team because we had skilled players who already knew how to play well and were good athletes. And none of the Division I schools had taken those athletes yet.”

Lane was a dynamic athlete. She played four sports at Hollins, and was an All-American in both field hockey and lacrosse. She also played basketball and took up fencing at the urging of her lacrosse coach, Lanetta Ware.

“I tried it and it was really great,” Lane said. “As far as for discipline reasons, in fencing, it’s just you and the opponent and if you lose any type of concentration, you’re dead. You have to be so quick and focused and prepared. It’s only a short time you have to focus. It’s really cool. I learned a lot. It helped my focus later on in the lacrosse field.”

Lane remains a huge proponent of playing multiple sports.

“I played three sports in high school and played tennis and golf in the summer and swam,” Lane said. “The one thing it helps — and I’ve been an athletic director, an official, a coach, a parent, and my oldest son played three sports in high school — it’s so much better for your body. You’re using all your muscles and it doesn’t give you burnout. You look forward to a fun, new season.

“I’m a proponent of playing Division III sports unless you need the scholarship to get you an education or you’re so good that you’re going professional, which is one percent. It gives you a life.”

Lane’s speed helped her stand out on the lacrosse field. She was a leading scorer for the Hollins program.

“I loved playing against half the people I played against because I could always beat them off the mark,” she said. “I got the first two steps. There were only a couple people that I hated playing against because you had to defend them as well as they defended you at the other end of the field.”

"I thought that was funny, 'All-World.' What do you play, Mars next?" — #USAWLAX legend Leslie Blankin Lane

More: https://t.co/nsDr4e0kEm pic.twitter.com/nnitXkSME8

— US Lacrosse Magazine (@USLacrosseMag) September 22, 2017

A couple weeks after graduating from Hollins, Lane remembers moving on to the U.S. women’s national team program, but having a rocky start.

“I go into the U.S. practices and we had to do this long distance run and I’m the last one done,” Lane recalled. “I’m a sprinter. I can beat anybody in a 30-yard sprint. And they’re cheering me on to help me finish. I thought, I really, really like these people, and they motivated you to train. For the first time, I seriously started to think about what training was. I’d gotten by on talent before that.”

Lane proved herself in the tryouts and found her spot on the U.S. offense. She went on to play on the 1981 U.S. Touring Team to Australia.

“Making the squad was amazing,” Lane said. “There was an in-house tour from England and I got to play on the reserve squad that year, and that was fun. Then, I made the travel team to Australia and that was such an amazing trip with such amazing people. It was incredible.”

It led into the first World Cup, which was played in 1982 in England. The U.S. trailed Australia, 6-1, at halftime of the championship game before it rallied. There were only a few minutes left in regulation when Lane tied the game with a shot she shoveled in underhand. The United States went on to win in overtime, something Lane credited to the coaches for practicing an overtime period every day in practice. She was named to the all-tournament team.

“Hollins gave me leadership skills or the ability to be confident in my ability,” Lane said. “It wasn’t until I got to the U.S. squad that they raised the level of everyone. When we started with (U.S. coach) Jackie Pitts, the best thing she did was raise the level of our skill. We would hardly drop a ball.

“We hardly made any mistakes. Our level of play was so high. I give the coaches credit. We had a group of kids that trusted each other and were selfless. There weren’t too many ‘I’s’ in that team.”

Lane was a four-time all-tournament honoree at the U.S. Women’s National Tournament. She has been inducted into the Springside Athletic Hall of Fame, the Pennsylvania Lacrosse Association Hall of Fame, the US Lacrosse Philadelphia/Eastern Pennsylvania Chapter’s Hall of Fame, and was among the three original inductees into Hollins very first Athletic Hall of Fame class. She is being inducted into the National Lacrosse Hall of Fame on September 23 as a truly great player.

“It’s such a team sport and I have so many fond memories of working together as a unit that I feel like if I make it, everybody I played with should make it,” Lane said. “They helped make me successful, and vice versa. It’s a very, very nice honor and I’m extremely humbled and proud. It’s pretty cool.”

Lane returned to Springside to teach and coach. She coached field hockey, basketball and lacrosse. In her first year as the girls' lacrosse coach, Lane’s team went unbeaten.

“I had never coached before,” Lane said. “I took my U.S. practices and applied them to my high school team.”

Lane’s coaching career mirrored her own playing career. It wasn’t very long, but it had variety and it had success.

She went on to become the athletic director at Springside before stepping down to focus on her family with husband, Fran Lane. Now grown, their two sons are college coaches while their daughter is in real estate. Lane is retired and spends her time reading and woodworking while splitting time between Philadelphia and South Carolina.

Doug Knight, Leslie Blankin Lane, Jim McDonald, Laurette Payette, Casey Powell, Jill Johnson Redfern, Brooks Sweet, Robyn Nye Wood and Don Zimmerman will be inducted into the National Lacrosse Hall of Fame in a black tie-optional ceremony Sept. 23 at The Grand Lodge in Hunt Valley, Md. For more information, visit uslacrosse.org/hof.