Seniors Declan Mulkerin and Charlie Zilinsky are among the best lacrosse players from Algonquin’s strong senior class, and they are both committed to playing Division III lacrosse at the University of New England (UNE) in Biddeford, Maine.
Mulkerin is a midfielder while Zilinksy is a defender and each commands his role on the field. Even though they play together now, the prospect of playing together at UNE was not a deciding factor for Mulkerin or Zilinksy. Rather, location was a key factor in choosing UNE for both Mulkerin and Zilinsky.
“It’s just an easy two-hour drive up North,” Mulkerin said. “It’s a beautiful campus. It’s right on the ocean.”
Additionally, academics played an important role in choosing UNE among other schools.
“[UNE] had basically the best of both worlds: athletics and academics,” Zilinsky said.
Both Mulkerin and Zilinsky began playing lacrosse at a young age. Zilinsky started playing when he was seven and Mulkeirn at age four.
“I really started taking lacrosse seriously in about fifth grade; that’s when I started playing club lacrosse,” Mulkerin said. “I realized it was definitely something I wanted to do going forward.”
Zilinsky started playing club lacrosse in middle school, and at this time, college lacrosse became a foreseeable possibility.
“College lacrosse wasn’t really a goal all the time; I started taking it seriously during COVID,” Zilinsky said. “Then I got onto a pretty serious club team where they kind of assumed everyone was trying to play college lacrosse.”
When it came to the recruiting process, Zilinksy and Mulkerin shared some common sentiments, but each had their own unique take on their experience.
“[The recruiting process] has definitely been stressful; it’s a lot of unknown,” Mulkerin said. “It’s a lot of reaching out to coaches with no response.”
Despite the fact that the recruiting process can be stressful for many, Zilinsky felt that it wasn’t overly intimidating or daunting.
“It was definitely stressful, but at the same time, it was pretty easy to get started,” Zilinsky said. “You would just type a short little email and then hopefully [the coaches] would get back to you, but I definitely second-guessed myself a bunch of times on whether I should say this, that or the other thing.”
With one of the most difficult steps towards playing a collegiate sport complete, Zilinsky and Mulkerin eagerly await their futures playing Division III lacrosse for UNE in the Conference of New England.
