Eric Pittard has traveled to many different places to play lacrosse for many different teams.

He started playing for Skaneateles. From then it was the Hotchkiss School, then the University of Virginia and finally back to Central New York to play for Cornell.

All the miles have finally paid off for the 2002 Skaneateles graduate. Last week Pittard was drafted by the Washington (D.C.) Bayhawks of Major League Lacrosse.

“Growing up, you watch the best players play lacrosse and I never thought I was going to have the opportunity to do it,” Pittard said. “But I had a pretty successful college career, which enabled me to get my name put into the draft.”

Pittard was drafted in the fifth round, 44th overall and one of five Cornell players taken. The attacker will start training with the Bayhawks this Friday.

“I'm extremely happy to be going to that particular team,” he said. “A lot of my old (Virginia) teammates are on the team so it should be a lot of fun playing with them again.”

Pittard is coming off a stellar season for Cornell, which lost to Duke in the Division I semifinals. He led the team in points as well as assists, and was named second-team All-America and first-team all-Ivy League. He was sixth in the country in points per game and fifth in assists per game.

The Big Red was ranked first in the country and was the only team to remain undefeated going into the NCAA, Division I tournament. Despite Cornell's perfect season, it was seeded fourth and faced top-seeded Duke on Championship weekend.

Pittard's squad battled back from a seven-goal deficit before Blue Devil Zack Greer scored with 17 seconds left to give Duke the 12-11 win.

“We were upset the way our season ended; it would have been nice to go undefeated,” he said. “We let them get ahead of us too much, too early. It definitely wasn't the way we wanted to end it, but I don't think any of us would trade anything for the season that we had.”

Pittard transferred to Cornell - where his brother David played - in 2005 after two seasons at Virginia. The Cavaliers had recruited Pittard since his sophomore year in high school, but he saw limited time once he got to Charlottesville.

He said he felt comfortable returning to Central New York and had the added bonus of playing with former Skaneateles and Hotchkiss teammates.

“I played some man-up, I played some midfield and some attack - kind of got scattered around a little bit,” Pittard said of his time at Virginia. “I just kind of wanted to move closer to home, so I transferred up to Cornell.”

Before Virginia, the 23-year-old spent a year at the Hotchkiss School in Lakeville, Conn. Before he arrived, he wasn't even sure if he wanted to play lacrosse in college.

“I recommend it to anybody who's not really sure what they want to do in college to take full advantage of doing a post-graduate year,” he said.

He primed his college game and received the Stuart Lindsay Award as attacker of the year. But awards were no new thing for Pittard. He was named to numerous All-CNY and All-League teams as a Laker. When he graduated, he was the Skaneateles record holder in goals, assists and total points.

That was five years ago. In a much shorter time span, Pittard will be entering the nation's capital as a professional - and not even using his hard-earned Cornell degree in applied economics in management.

“I'm extremely excited about Friday to see some of my old teammates and meet some new teammates,” he said. “It should be fun.”