While many seniors will be leaving high school behind and heading off to college in the fall, this is not the case for a senior who will return to high school as a ‘super senior’ or fifth year student in a postgraduate program.

Peter Mascheroni is taking a fifth year at the Lawrenceville School in New Jersey so that he can pursue his passion for lacrosse at the collegiate level.

“It’s basically another chance to go get recruited and go play in college,” Mascheroni said.

Mascheroni said he decided to apply to fifth year programs along with his college applications after he injured himself during his junior lacrosse season.

“I tore two ligaments off the bone of my ankle and so I couldn’t play the second half of my season which is the main part of recruiting for lacrosse,” Mascheroni said. “I kind of kept it in the back of my mind, not sure if I wanted to go do a fifth year and when I didn’t get into some of the colleges I wanted to, I figured I might as well.”

Taking a fifth year for athletics is not uncommon among high school athletes, Redwood included. Last year Briton Barge and Samson Donick both took a fifth year at boarding schools for lacrosse and basketball, respectively. Donick was recruited to play at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Barge was recruited to play at Bellarmine.

“It was like the college application process where I applied to colleges, with Lawrenceville almost as a backup or safety school. When I realized that the colleges I got into I didn’t want to go to, but wanted to still play lacrosse in college, I pursued it almost as a college option,” Mascheroni said. “You don’t commit there, in a sense, you apply as a lacrosse recruit.”

Mascheroni said he is hoping to get recruited and know where he is going before the season even starts at Lawrenceville.

He said he is going to try out for the Under Armour All-America lacrosse (UAAA) team as well as two travel teams that he has been playing for since his freshman year, called Alcatraz Outlaws and Advanced.

“[UAAA] take the best 25 kids from California and Washington and the best 25 kids from another few collection of states and they bring them all together and have a tournament with supposedly the top players around the country,” Mascheroni said.

He said that the coaches do the talking for the players on the UAAA and hopefully get college coaches to watch the players.

“The coaches will come watch you play and see how good you are. They’ll either contact you afterward saying ‘yes we’re interested in you, I want you to come play for our school’ or ‘no I don’t really like this kid that much,’” Mascheroni said. “Its a way to get exposure to the coaches.”

According to Mascheroni, senior Liam Bourke played for the UAAA last summer and  seniors Patrick Tracy and Matt Kennis played for the two travel teams. All three were recruited.