If you're a little like me, waiting for the fall sports season to begin, you might have let your car ease past Trinity College in Hartford at the beginning of the week. And you might have noticed the men's soccer team is nowhere to be seen.

That's because the Bantams began an 11-day tour of Spain on August 8 where they'll play six exhibition games against lower level professional clubs and the Gibraltar National Team.

Trinity's soccer guys will head to Madrid with tentative game dates scheduled for seven contests, then on to Gibraltar, and to Granada. The Bantams return to New York on August 18.

Drew Murphy (Woodbury/ Taft), a senior midfielder for the Bantams, is one of the team's tri-captains. In June, he was named the recipient of the college's Bob Harron Award as the college's top junior male scholar athlete of the year.

Drew played in 12 games and started 11 last fall, recording one assist, and was named to the NESCAC Fall All-Academic Team. An economics major, he maintains a 4.01 G.P.A.

The team's numbers weren't as good - the Bantams were 3-9-1 overall and 0-8-1 in the New England Small College Athletic Conference.

The Trinity web site is tracking the team through its Spanish tour, with reports from head coach Mike Pilger. In the first game on Spanish soil, the Bantams got plucked by a professional fifth division team, 3-0.

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And Trinity isn't the only team doing a little traveling.

Wheaton College men's soccer team just finished an international playing tour of England, Italy and Switzerland. The European trip was the first of its kind for any Wheaton program in the 21-team athletic department.

Thirteen-year head coach Matt Cushing took a contingent of returning Lyon players to play five games against international opposition over seven days.

The Blue and White's first game was against Stevenage Borough at England's North Hertfordshire College. Game two was slated for the next day in Italy, where the Lyons faced Equipe Lombardia in Cogliate.

On the third day, Wheaton was scheduled to play AC Lugano in Switzerland. For the fourth match in four days, the Lyons returned to Italy where they met AC Este. After a one-day break, the Lyons matched up with AC Voghera in the tour's finale.

The guys also did some sightseeing and visited Milan's San Siro Stadium, in addition to taking in a professional exhibition game between Premier League club Charlton Athletic and the National Team of New Zealand in England.

Following that game, the group has a social planned in central London at the house of Wheaton sophomore Justin Landsberger (London, England/American School).

Returning to his roots, the second-year midfielder appeared in five games as a freshman and scored his first collegiate goal in a 5-0 victory over Rivier College on September 28, 2005.

Wheaton is coming off its third straight NCAA Tournament appearance after posting a 13-5-2 record in 2005. Finishing 5-0-1 in the New England Women's and Men's Athletic Conference (NEWMAC), Wheaton won its fifth regular season and tournament titles.

The Lyons feature senior goalkeeper Matt Pachniuk (Newtown), an All-NEWMAC performer. Matt and his teammates begin their regular season with a home game against SUNY New Paltz on September 1.

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Lowell Spinners first-year pitcher Jeff Farrell (Naugatuck/Southern Connecticut State) went six strong innings last Tuesday night against the Vermont Lake Monsters (Do Minor League baseball teams have great names or what?) but did not get a decision in a 3-1 team loss.

Jeff allowed one run, struck out three and scattered four hits, and his ERA keeps coming down - it's now 7.25. Not good, but about half of where it started.

He has appeared in eight games and started all of them. At the moment, he has a 1-5 record, pitching 32 innings, yielded 27 runs on 39 hits, and has struck out 16 while allowing 14 walks.

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The field hockey team at Lasell College went 6-12 last year, 3-6 in the North Atlantic Conference, but appears poised for much more, with an excellent coaching staff that includes Laura Thibodeau (Pomperaug/UConn).

Laura, a midfielder for the Huskies, got her first degree in sports marketing, then joined the coaching staff at Lasell for the 2004 season.

She now has more than five years of summer camp coaching experience and this May received her Masters of Science degree in management with a concentration in marketing from Lasell.

The Blazers return 17 players this fall, eight of them starters from last year.

Junior goalkeeper Kristina Warner (Nonnewaug) played in three games last season and allowed just one goal and got credit for one win. She made four saves in 106 minutes of action.

Freshman forward Caitlin Williams (Newtown) made a big splash in her first year of collegiate competition, playing in all 18 games for the Blazers and starting 14 of them. She scored three goals - one of them a game-winner.

The Blazers play their first game against Worcester Polytechnic Institute on September 2, at home.

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Freshman catcher Shane Murphy (Gunnery) finished his first baseball season at Franklin Pierce College by getting into three games for the 46-13 Ravens.

Shane isn't credited with any at-bats, but he did draw a walk, so at least he got the chance to wave the lumber at the opposition. He made one put-out and had two assists.

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In a little less than two weeks' time, college sports will open up for real. Do you have news about a local athlete who will be competing in a college sport this fall? Now is the time to drop me a line at jaddyman@snet.net. And if you haven't signed up for a school-year subscription to Voices for your going-away athlete, now's the time for that, too. Nobody covers local college athletes like we do.