Men’s lacrosse secured its first victory of the year late last semester by beating cancer, apparently. Wait, no, they won a fundraising competition in support of those affected by cancer. As part of The HEADstrong’s Foundation’s “Mustache Madness” competition in November, the Bobcats raised over $28,000 to take home the honors. For the competition, the team grew out their best facial hair for the entire month, and ran multiple events (such as pie-ing) in support of the cause.

TJ Underhill ‘27 raised the most money on the team with a contribution of over $2,500. He explained that this fundraiser was especially important to him because of the cause.

“Unfortunately, I’ve had a bit of a history with cancer in my surrounding families. But I have a good network back home on the West Coast, since I’m originally from California. There’s a foundation there that I’ve been a part of since I was nine years old, and I’ve had some good contacts back there that helped, so it was great for them to support a new cause over here on the East Coast,” he said.

Underhill added that the competition, which included other collegiate programs such as Arcadia University, Boston College, Michigan University, Pennsylvania State, and Wesleyan University, served as an important bonding experience for the team.

“It definitely brought us together a lot more as a team. It was a great common goal for us to push forward and the competition made it even better, beating out the other colleges,” he explained.

While Underhill himself admitted he struggled to grow much of a mustache, he pointed to senior Jack Daoust’s ‘24 chevron stache as a favorite of the team’s.

“He had quite an amazing mustache,” he said with a laugh.