During the pandemic, while Clair Luethy was waiting for the Fitch High School girls' lacrosse team to start playing again, she didn't have far to go to find someone with whom to commiserate. Her dad, Michael, is the head coach at Fitch and has been Clair's youth lacrosse coach since her days as a beginner.

"He was definitely really bummed out," Clair said of missing the 2020 season. "But he just started getting ready for the next one, keeping his head high. He really likes it.

"... I would say once he started coaching at the high school level, it became a little more intense but he stayed the same. He loves the game. He wants us to have fun and play hard. He's really fair. He sets a goal for us and he's really driven but he's not too hard on us. He's not 'in it to win it.' He wants us to get something out of it. He's a considerate coach."

Once the season began, Fitch finished 13-4 overall with a berth in the Eastern Connecticut Conference Division I tournament championship game and a Class M state quarterfinal bid. Clair was an All-ECC Division I and all-state selection on defense.

Michael has been the head coach at Fitch since 2019 and was the assistant coach for three seasons prior to that under former coach Jenna Tucchio. He has his Ph.D. in molecular biology and is the director of biology at Enko, a crop health company in Mystic.

Clair, the second-youngest of five children, plans to major in engineering at either Roger Williams or the University of Mississippi. She graduated from Fitch on Friday.

"He's been coaching me for a lot of youth, watching games, cheering for me in games," Clair said of what memories she has of the game with her dad. "Right before COVID we went and saw the lacrosse national championship game at Hopkins University. That was super exciting, too."