For Axel Galeano ’08, playing soccer at St. Lawrence has better prepared him for the real world and has shown him what it means to really be a team player.

During his first year, Axel admits, he was the kind of soccer player who focused more on how he was playing. But coming to St. Lawrence taught him more about what it means to work as a team. 

“My attitude toward the soccer program and my teammates has changed throughout my four years at St. Lawrence,” he explains.  “As an individual, you can do so much, but with teammates who expect you to work hard and get better every day because they’re doing that for you, you can do so much more.”

“Our program has a great reputation that we, as members of the team, have had to live up to and maintain, and that’s a heavy weight on the players,” Axel says.  “We not only have a responsibility to play well and represent ourselves, but we’re always representing each other and St. Lawrence, and that’s an honor.”

Axel, who is a Spanish and sociology double major, quickly realized that people can place expectations on him, but he’s the only one who controls whether he meets those expectations. “It’s up to you to do the things someone else wants you to do,” he says.  “When you set goals, you have to want to accomplish those goals.  As a team, we have goals, and as long as we work hard individually and together, we can achieve them.”

When the Queens, NY, native and Brooklyn Friends School alumnus graduates in December, he will take the many lessons he’s learned from his teammates and coaches and apply them to whatever is ahead for him.  “I want to do something business-oriented where things can get competitive, because that’s something I’ve really enjoyed about playing soccer,” he says.