Blue Devils playing for more than a national title

BALTIMORE -- Jimmy Regan, the former Duke lacrosse player from Rockville Center, N.Y., will not be in attendance at M&T Bank Stadium on Memorial Day to see his alma mater challenge Johns Hopkins for the NCAA Division I lacrosse national title.

The alumnus from the class of 2003 will not be paying $20 to park in the lots surrounding the stadium for the pre-game tailgating. He won't join with fellow former Blue Devils in raising a Duke-blue Solo cup to the accomplishments of this year's team.

Regan, an Army sergeant from the 3rd Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment, was killed Feb. 9 at age 26 when his vehicle was hit by an explosive in Northern Iraq. Having earned a Purple Heart, Bronze Medal and several other medals in his four tours of duty split between Iraq and Afghanistan, Regan was buried with full military honors on a wintry February day in Virginia.

"With what Memorial Day means for honoring the military, let alone that the lacrosse community has its championship on this day every year, [Jimmy's father] told me that Jimmy would be smiling down on us," said Duke assistant coach Kevin Cassese, who knew Regan from the Long Island lacrosse landscape before playing three years with him at Duke. His death "just put things in perspective, when all the news was about the Duke administration and the district attorney, to hear that a friend passed away was a separate issue."

During a year in which three Duke lacrosse players, Reade Seligmann, Collin Finnerty and David Evans, were accused and acquitted of rape; head coach Mike Pressler was fired and the season was canceled, nothing had presented the finality Regan's fatality brought. "To be at his funeral mass in Manhasset, N.Y., and listening to one of my former players eulogize him was the most emotional scene to encounter," Pressler said via phone as he drove toward Baltimore for the Final Four on Sunday afternoon. "The bagpipes were playing, the hearse came in and his Army Ranger's unit entered behind them. There were Duke alums, and people that I still had not gained closure with, and Jimmy brought it all together in a community of lacrosse, Duke and service to the Army."

While the team has tried to keep the off-field distractions on the periphery, players still wear warm-up jerseys with the numbers 6, 45, and 13, to represent Evans, Seligmann and Finnerty, respectively. Ever present, though, on the back of their helmets are Regan's initials "J.R." and the No. 10 to honor the fallen soldier. "

As a link between our past, present and future, coach Cassese told us about Jimmy to understand what he stood for and why we were honoring him," says Brad Ross, a 6-foot, 190-pound junior midfielder who scored two goals in the semifinal win over Cornell and carries the additional weight of wearing Regan's No. 10. "When his jersey was retired during our game against Army at home, his Rangers unit was there and they told me I better live up to his name. They got their point across."