For Jane Hansen, the decision to go to Northwestern came naturally.
The Wildcats were part of her DNA, and that’s not exactly a metaphor. Her cousins, Meredith and Alex Frank, combined to win seven NCAA championships during Northwestern’s barrier-breaking, time zone-smashing success from 2005-12.
“My sister [Elle] and I would always go to their final four games, and it created this picture,” Hansen said. “It was like, ‘Wow, this is where we want to be. This would be a dream.”
Elle Hansen is the oldest, so the dream came true for her first. However, Jane Hansen committed next and before entering high school because of the recruiting rules at the time.
The reality didn’t play out as a picture-perfect fairytale, though. The pandemic shortened Hansen’s freshman year in 2020. “A shock to everyone,” she said.
Hansen unexpectedly missed another season in 2022 after tearing her ACL. It made for another (albeit bittersweet) way to bond with her sister, whose junior season was cut short for the same reason. Hansen injured her knee just a week after her sister underwent a second surgery.
“I had watched her go through the injury, and then I had my injury, and I had to learn a lot about myself,” she said. “She was a huge guide. She told me, ‘I’ve been through this, and I’m here for you.’ I grew a lot from that individually, but having my sister by my side was a big part of that growth.”
Still, Hansen’s injury, surgery and recovery played into a long-time bugaboo.
“The biggest battle in growth was just believing in herself,” Northwestern coach Kelly Amonte Hiller said.
It sounds surprising. Hansen arrived in Evanston as the No. 7 recruit in her high school class, according to Inside Lacrosse, having produced an All-American career at Cohasset (Mass.). Still, she never bought too much into her own hype. And while humility is appreciated, it manifested into a lack of self-confidence early in her career.
“When I first got here, confidence in lacrosse was a struggle,” Hansen said. “I needed to come out of my shell. I had a lot of conversations with Kelly about how I could get the confidence. The ACL injury, where I was away from the sport I loved, opened my eyes. I had countless conversations with Kelly, and she kept telling me, ‘Look at all this work you put in to get back stronger. Trust your body.’”
It took a lot — and falling — to internalize Amonte Hiller’s words.
“There was definitely a lot of fear until I got knocked to the ground in practice,” Hansen said. “I got up and was like, ‘OK. I trust myself again. I trust my knee. I trust my leg. I trust the work I put in rehab.’ It got to the point where I stopped thinking about my leg and started having fun again.”
Hansen began taking more chances, going harder for ground balls and trying for interceptions. She went from having 11 caused turnovers in 2021 to 23 caused turnovers the year she returned (2023). She caused 30 turnovers last season and has 42 entering the final weekend of her collegiate playing career.
But let’s stay in 2023 for a moment. Back on the field and alongside her sister, Hansen helped Northwestern do something it hadn’t done since their cousin, Alex Frank, graduated in 2012: Win the national championship. The Franks were in the stands to see the nine-year drought broken.
“Part of the dream of coming to Northwestern was winning a national championship with my sister, and it was like, ‘This is our time to do it,’” Hansen said. “It was special, and it was cool to go over to our cousins and hug them. It was the reverse of when we were kids.”
The Wildcats fell one goal short of winning a second national title last season, falling to Boston College — the same team they’ll face Friday (5:30 p.m. EDT, ESPNU) in the second NCAA semifinal at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Mass.
Hansen enters championship weekend playing some of the best lacrosse of her career. She tallied five caused turnovers in the Big Ten semifinal and championship games — wins over Johns Hopkins and Maryland, respectively — and was named the tournament’s most outstanding player.
“With the past year being my very last go at Northwestern, I’ve shifted my mentality,” she said. “I’ll ask myself, ‘What are you afraid of? Take risks, take chances and go put your best foot forward.”
Indeed, it’s not the stats that stand out to Amonte Hiller.
“She’s in a good place where she understands who she is,” Amonte Hiller said. “She understands her strengths, and she's really just going for it.”
The Wildcats have needed this version of Hansen in the postseason. Their Big Ten tournament wins were by one goal each. Then Penn gave Northwestern all it could handle in the NCAA quarterfinals last week, a five-goal third-quarter run pulling the Quakers to within 11-10 with less than five minutes to go in the frame.
But Hansen said these tests have Northwestern entering the national semifinals confident, despite Boston College being favored to advance to the championship game for the eighth straight year (not including 2020).
“We have the ability to reset and not focus too much on the scoreboard,” she said. “After they score, after we score, it’s always like, ‘It’s 0-0, leave that play in the past.’ We can learn from mistakes, acknowledge mistakes and go forward. We have a level of emotional control, and we trust ourselves and the game plan. We don’t get too ahead of ourselves, and we know what we are capable of.”
It’s a journey Hansen has walked individually, too, the lessons from which will endure well beyond Memorial Day weekend.
“Adversity is all around us,” she said. “I've had to learn that you take adversity and grow from it.”
