Report: Patriots invite former All-American lacrosse player Dox Aitken for tryout at training camp
BOSTON -- It wouldn't be a Patriots offseason without an unorthodox roster move from Bill Belichick. On Friday, we finally learned what this year's version would be.
A To Z Sports' Doug Kyed reported that the Patriots have invited Dox Aitken to training camp for a tryout with New England.
Aitken may not be a name known well to football fans, because he spent the bulk of his collegiate athletic career playing lacrosse.
A 6-foot-2, 210-pound midfielder at the University of Virginia, Aitken was a USILA All-American honorable mention and an Inside Lacross All-American honorable mention in 2021 for the Cavaliers, when he scored 17 goals and tallied six assists. His UVA bio says that he's the all-time point and goal leader by a midfielder in school history, and he ranks No. 4 overall in program history in goals with 138.
He was First Team All-American in 2019 and 2018, and he made the third team for Inside Lacrosse's All-American team in 2020.
Aitken did spend the fall of 2021 at Villanova -- his hometown -- playing football, though he didn't record any stats before returning to UVA to continue his lacrosse career.
Aitken has played professionally for Atlas Lacrosse Club in the Premier Lacrosse League, and he's also a Customer Success Manager for a data analytics and marketing company, according to his LinkedIn profile.
If that doesn't sound like the background for the next great NFL player, well, that's because NFL players usually progress their careers through more traditional routes. But Belichick's always kept an eye out for talent where nobody's looking, and he's always been open to players who might have found more success in other sports.
Sometimes, it's a total transformation, like with collegiate wrestler-turned-NFL guard Stephen Neal. Other times, a player has already embarked upon a football career, like collegiate lacrosse player Chris Hogan. Sometimes, it's just a diamond in the rough situation, like Malcolm Butler out of West Alabama, Gunner Olszewski out of Bemidji State (Olszewski switched from defense to offense, too), or of course, college-QB-turned-NFL-WR Julian Edelman out of Kent State.
Countless other players have not worked out quite as well, but the point is that Belichick likes to exhaust any and all avenues of exploration when it comes to finding players that might help the football team. Dox Aitken is the latest to join the list.
