These are two documents that have been around for quite a while and have no published author, like lacrosse has no named inventor. Native Americans were obviously a huge part of the first American Thanksgiving, which was an extension of their own "holiday." The Native Americans who invented lacrosse were not those present at that first Thanksgiving; the lacrosse-playing natives were the Iroquois Nation - a confederacy of Six Nations really, that were in many ways emulated by our founding fathers in the formation of our federalist government.

THANKSGIVING ADDRESS OF THE NORTH AMERICAN INDIAN

Long before there were any white people in North America, our people communicated with the Creator at every sunrise and at every sunset. Our way of communication was one of thanksgiving -- a thanksgiving for all the gifts that were bestowed on us by the creator. With the finest words that could be spoken, our ancestors acknowledged all the life forces on Mother Earth and everything else between them and the dwelling place of the Great Spirit, our creator. Our elders would tell us, "We have directed our voices towards our Creator in the best way we are able to do. Let us be satisfied that we have acknowledged the creations around and above us. We believe that the Creator wishes us to regard the life cycle with the greatest respect and appreciation. Our thanks are to be expressed with each new day."

THE CREATOR'S GAME

The Game of lacrosse was given to our people by the Creator to play for his amusement. Just as a parent will gain much amusement at the sight of watching his child playing joyfully with a new gift, so it was intended that the Creator be similarly amused by viewing his "children" playing lacrosse in a manner which was so defiant of fatigue. This is our belief, and when the four Great Messengers came, the Creator reiterated to us that his game should be played.

There is a long history of speculation about where the game of lacrosse originated, but as Natives of North America, this question has little significance. We do not wonder who invented lacrosse, or when and where; our ancestors have been playing the game for centuries -- for the Creator.

Tewaarathon was not just played to call the Creator's attention to the efforts of the medicine people or simply for one's personal enjoyment and physical fitness. Tewaarathon, because it came from the Creator himself, was also played to bestow honor and respect to these members living on Mother Earth who had done great things for the Nation. Related to this, Tewaarathon also constituted a means of offering thanksgiving to the Creator for having allowed an elder or medicine person to remain with the Nation so that person could continue to share the richness of his full life with the younger members.

It is true that Tewaarathon (or lacrosse) does demand physical fitness, and participants would train for many months to prepare themselves for these important games, but what is more significant is that our people believed that all things on Mother Earth were a gift of the Creator and following the Creator's instructions. Because lacrosse was such a gift, the difficult training for Tewaarathon was not seen as a burden of work, but rather this training was enjoyed as a preparation to partaking in a precious gift. A participant in Tewaarathon believed that his ability to play was a gift itself and that the enjoyment of playing rested in freely giving his best effort. Because only the participant really knew when his effort had been well prepared and complete, the training for Tewaarathon was related to enjoying one's gift in the view of the very one who had been so generous. It is unfortunate that the fervor which our people took to the field of play was often misinterpreted by the European eye which was untrained to the relationship between the Indian, Tewaarathon, and the Creator. As for the players, in a game of such great importance, there were no bad feelings for any accidental gestures because both teams realized the sincerity of the effort.

Why did our people play lacrosse with such enthusiasm? As mentioned earlier, part of this explanation lies in the link between lacrosse and its status as a gift from the Creator, but lacrosse had additional spiritual significance as well. In times when an elder or anyone in the Nation became sick, the medicine people would call upon the Life Forces of Mother Earth to remedy the sickness. The medicine people would prepare and administer the medicines obtained from Mother Earth, and then they would call for a lacrosse game to be played to provide additional power for the medicine. Our people believed that by demonstrating to the Creator that his people had not forgotten his gift, the Creator would look favorably upon their efforts and therefore would not forget the stricken member. The game was played for the Creator's attention and his fair decision as to whether or not the stricken member recovered or not. The medicine people would prepare and administer the medicines, and the game preceded by sacred ritual would be played with the sincerest effort. If the stricken member failed to recover, no one doubted the decision of the Creator.

A MIXED HISTORY

I would be remiss if I did not point out that the history between the Iroquois and the U.S. government has not been all good. In the infancy of our nation and while we were still under British rule, the Iroquois had signed treaties with the British and local groups whom they believed to be one in the same, loyal to the great white chief George (King George). But during the Revolutionary War, the confederacy was torn by local and national treaties they always intended to honor. Some fought for the British and some for the colonies, splitting Iroquois against Iroquois in many cases. But one of the uglier episodes in our country’s history unfolded during and after the Revolutionary War when George Washington sent two of his generals, John Sullivan and James Clinton, and an army of more than 6,200 men, or one-fourth of what was then our American military to destroy, without discrimination, at least forty Iroquois villages in what is now upstate New York in retaliation for Iroquois and Tory attacks against American settlements earlier in the war.

His orders read as follows:

The Expedition you are appointed to command is to be directed against the hostile tribes of the Six Nations of Indians, with their associates and adherents. The immediate objects are the total destruction and devastation of their settlements, and the capture of as many prisoners of every age and sex as possible. It will be essential to ruin their crops now in the ground and prevent their planting more.

- Orders of George Washington to General John Sullivan, May 31, 1779

George Washington is still known among the Iroquois as Conotocarious, or "Town Destroyer." And while this is all ancient history, this generic title for the president of the United States among many Iroquois remains. And while there are some within the Six Nations that still resent the actions of the ancestors of white Americans (and Canadians), in lacrosse, the Iroquois are revered in the lacrosse community as the inventor and custodian of the game and compete in our world games as a nation proudly. The greatest award in college lacrosse, like the Heisman Trophy in football, is called the Tewaaraton Award (the Mohawk name for lacrosse), honoring the native tradition and a specific member community within the Six Nations each year. The Six Nations are the Mohawk, the Oneida, the Onondaga, the Cayuga, the Seneca and the Tuscarora. The Iroquois call themselves the Haudenosaunee.

Kids on an outdoor box surface in Onondaga, N.Y.

I have been to the all-aboriginal Nation’s Cup tournament many times, a box lacrosse tournament held annually on native territory or “reservations” in New York and Canada, and have been treated very well always, often as the only white American in attendance. The Haudenosaunee are the true friend of a real lacrosse fan who shows respect and recognition of its tradition and origins.

That said, there are still some confrontations that occur among the Iroquois on that score. A few years back, as I attended the Nation’s Cup on the Onondaga reservation near Syracuse, N.Y., each morning as I drove onto the territory, I noticed that a billboard had been erected overnight that read something like “We the indigenous people own the United States of America," but within an hour, each day, the elders and reservation authorities (all Iroquois) had removed it. I have never felt unwelcome at these events by any individual. In fact, I would say that half of my better friends in the game are Iroquois. Shouts out! You know who you are.

At the 2007 World Indoor Championships, held in Halifax, Nova Scotia, I was one of perhaps three or four non-natives invited to the lobster feast held for the Iroquois national team by the local native tribe, the Micmac (pronounced Micmaw), who do not have a lacrosse heritage. It was a bounty of brotherhood, food and celebration beyond anything I have experienced and I will remember it and their hospitality forever. With perhaps one-tenth or less of the potential players to draw from, the Iroquois Nation lost in the finals of the world championship to Team Canada in one of the closest, hardest-fought and exciting games I have ever witnessed after both beat the United States in early rounds. I could not have been more proud of my many friends on the team.

So, as we, the recipients of this great game from a proud and ancient culture celebrate our Thanksgiving, I always remind true lacrosse fans to include thanks to the Native Americans and the tremendous effort they have made to preserve the game though centuries of good and bad occurrences. It is simply irresponsible to celebrate the game without celebrating them.

All too often, young players these days have no idea where the sport came from and think that perhaps someone in Baltimore or Long Island made it up like someone made up basketball (actually modeled in part after lacrosse). Lacrosse is far older and far more spiritually connected to its originators than any game I know of. The game you play now is a bit different than the game they played centuries ago (read more about the history), but you simply would not be playing if it weren’t for the passing of the game from fathers to sons for hundreds of years by our Native American brothers. When you pass it on to your sons and daughters, be sure to give credit where credit is due and this Thanksgiving, perhaps include these great people in your prayers if the game is something you are thankful for.

Posted by John Weaver at 6:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

Fall lacrosse or "fall ball", as it is called, has evolved. Only a few short years ago, lacrosse play in the offseason was typically designed to improve a player’s game. Sure, the coaches running the camps or tournaments would use the opportunity to see kids and possibly recruit, but improvement was the purpose of the play.

It then became common that each college head coach would hold a camp and college assistants would staff many camps, all of them keeping an eye out for possible recruits for their programs. But then tournaments with no instruction or even a winner emerged for the sole purposes of recruiting. Coaches would line the fields after being invited by the tournament staff. Tournaments would announce before the event which coaches they might expect to attend as publicity. All of the sudden, a cottage industry existed. The tournaments became so popular for recruiting and selling recruitment that it was getting out of hand. The demands on coaches and players to be everywhere, all the time, in order to succeed was just too much.

Over the last few years, a series of often self-imposed rules and regulations have reigned in the fall, creating a manageable recruiting platform that works for college coaches and potential college players. The Division I coaches can only attend and recruit lacrosse players in the month of November in the fall. This left time for October fall play by the college teams and gave the coaches a life during December so they might have at least one inactive month to plan for next year, celebrate the holidays and maybe even spend some time at home with their families.

As you might imagine, this means that November has intensified and become a recruiting tour for coaches and their assistants and thousands of unsigned athletes. From California to Maryland, fall tournaments have popped up and some of the original ones have become massive must-attend events, hosting hundreds of teams and often upwards of 50 college coaches on a single Saturday or Sunday. It’s a phenomenon.

I recently attended the National Recruiting Lacrosse Tournament at St. Paul’s School, where field after field was jammed with games. Parked cars filled every other spot of gravel or green on campus -- and it’s a big campus. The tournament is hosted by Aloha Tournaments, one of the companies that revolutionized the fall ball industry. And they do it well. Each coach is provided with a complete and accurate roster notebook and schedule for the day, as well as food and drink and reserved parking that is close to the action. Mine was not.

But peering over the madras of fields, each lined with woolen bundled coaches who’ve carried portable lawn chairs, clipboards and tournament roster notebooks from field to field all day, I wondered how they knew who they wanted to see, where to go, whether they could see enough in this format to make good decisions and many more questions. So I asked.

I chose two veterans of the recruiting game, Gettysburg head coach Hank Janczyk and Georgetown assistant Scott Urick. The Division I and Division III perspectives are a bit different, so between the two of them I knew I’d get the full story.

Janczyk has been at Gettysburg for 22 years. He’s seen the recruiting game shift from a small group of prep schools to a big-time industry. He’s a great coach. His Gettysburg teams usually win their conference and go pretty far in the NCAA tournament. He is second in career victories among all active Division III men’s lacrosse coaches.

Urick may be more known to you as a star professional player in Major League Lacrosse. He has been an assistant at Georgetown, to his legendary father, Dave Urick, for seven years. He played for his father with the Hoyas before that. As a star player and now a coach, he’s seen recruiting from every angle. Both coaches had unique perspectives and were very helpful in my quest.

Urick confirmed what Janczyk told us about the DI rules -- that the month of November is the only month that they are allowed to go to these recruiting tournaments in the fall. “That’s why you see so many coaches at the November tournaments and that’s why there are so many tournaments all month long, every weekend," he said.

In DIII, Janczyk is allowed to recruit past Dec. 1. "For us," Janczyk said, “because there is no time period, we recruit longer and theirs (DI) is more intense." He is glad, however, that the DI rule has, for all intents and purposes, compacted the fall recruiting season because he likes to spend time with his family. It seemed that his wife might have set some rules where the NCAA had not previously.

DI has other constrictions on fall recruiting. While the staff of a DI lacrosse team may have three full-time paid staff, only two are allowed to recruit or attend the fall tournaments on the same day. So Urick says they split up to cover as much ground as they can. Both coaches may be at the same large fall tournament, but that’s not likely since there are so many. If they are, you’ll never see them sitting next to each other discussing players. While there are so many tournaments and so many games, the limited window of recruiting time makes each very valuable and resources (coaches) need to be spread out for the most efficiency.

If you see two coaches chatting it up on the sideline, they are likely opposing coaches, most of whom are friends within the industry. Urick did confirm that what you see is mostly small talk and the conversation is very friendly but rarely has to do with the play on the field. “We keep to ourselves on the sidelines, mostly. It’s obvious sometimes that we’re all looking at the same guys. We are competitors after all," Urick said. “We keep our thoughts on players close to the vest."

Both coaches said that these fall tournaments are usually a follow-up look at the kids they have already seen before and are specifically there to see again. They agreed that in spring, a real high school game is a better barometer of the athlete’s ability, not just because all the players are present but because at that point they are playing on a team and not in the all-star type of setting the tournaments usually provide. Also, both referred to the length of the tournament games as not long enough to get a full impression of the players.

Consistency is important and the coaches want to see a kid multiple times. If he’s impressive as a sophomore, he’s worth seeing as a junior. If he’s still impressive and has shown growth as a junior, then the coaches retain interest. Many fall off during the process. That’s how the lists are narrowed and things are boiled down to the final rosters and the great lacrosse action we see in real college games in the spring. Urick said, “We’d like to see each young man as many times as possible. A spring game gives us a better sense, but then we like to see them in more than a few tournaments and camps. It’s harder to get a good read in the all-star like setting [of tournaments]. In some cases they are playing only half-hour games."

Urick says, “Most of the kids I saw that day [at St. Paul’s] I knew of previously. Some we already want to be Hoyas. Some we want to see more of in order to make a decision. In the summer camps and previous spring you make a comprehensive list of juniors and rising seniors. For us, it’s very important to have a good and organized list of seniors to see."

Janczyk says the DIII school lists are likely longer because there are many more kids at that level than DI. He also thinks the DI teams pare their lists much earlier than the DIII schools.

“We see a lot of kids in the summer," Janczyk said. “In the summertime you see a kid for longer so you get a better impression. The Gait camp is here at Gettysburg and Dave Urick’s camp (coincidentally) are among the events we attend. So we have a list of juniors and sophomores to see again. So you look at the teams that are coming and your first objective is to see the kids that are already on your radar. Secondly we look to good teams and see who might be [new]. Then we’ll also try to see the kids that send us letters or e-mails to tell us that they are playing in the event.”

There are some exceptions to the general rule of trying to see a kid many times in the recruiting process. Scott Urick is flying out to the High Rollers Tournament in Los Angeles this weekend. Mostly West Coast teams will be playing in that one and those players may very well not be on the radar of most coaches yet. “We don’t know much about the kids at these but we would be naive to think we would not see great talent," Urick said. I asked him if he’d be alone on the sidelines out there and he expected that at least a dozen big programs would have someone there alongside him. That the West Coast has lacrosse talent worth recruiting is not such a secret any more.

Both coaches mentioned that many of the athletes on their “lists” are missing from the fall tournaments. Urick says many of the Hoyas players also played hockey, football or basketball in high school. He also said that those missing athletes sometimes make the ones who are present look better than they are compared to the field that is present. Janczyk thinks up to 65 percent of the kids he recruits are playing other sports in the fall.

I asked if a kid can get on the coaches’ radar late in the game, say as a senior. Janczyk said that high school coaches call with late bloomers and every once in a while they’ll just see a kid at a tournament that’s not on the radar already, but that is rare. There are a finite number of players and these coaches are very organized with long lists of kids they follow. They know most of the kids’ names on the rosters that will play in college at their levels. Urick says that they are sometimes pleasantly surprised and see a kid they like that’s not on their lists already. They will sometimes check out a player that has contacted the program beforehand, mostly done by e-mail.

I asked if they made contact with that type of kid at the game where they see them and are impressed and he laughed. The coaches are not allowed to walk up and talk to the players at the tournament for obvious reasons. They might swarm around a kid on the postgame field like reporters do after big celebrities. Arguments could easily result. Fights could break out in a worst-case scenario and coaches trend generally toward more dignified approach, literally. After the tournament is over and the coach is back in the office, they may call a senior directly if the contact information was in the tournament’s materials. If the player is a junior, they can call the coach, mail or even e-mail the player.

I asked Urick how early a kid might get noticed by college coaches. He noted that they watch some pretty good high school teams all spring. “If there’s a freshman or sophomore that is impressive on a varsity team, we take note and file that young man’s name away and revisit it down the road”.

By the time a late bloomer becomes a late bloomer, it may be too late for many programs to take him, thanks to early-decision application. Early decision is simply the process of applying to a college or university based on the grades a student has as a junior. The student has to keep up his grades in order to keep his admission but it commits them to a school as early as October of their senior year. It’s all up to admissions in the end. At Gettysburg, nearly everyone on the team applies early decision now. Almost all roster spots are now taken up by early-decision candidates.

I did not talk to Urick about early decision as an option for players, but I am sure that many kids choose this whether they are athletes or not at highly competitive Georgetown. The DI schools started it and the domino effect has it in use at most schools for lacrosse recruiting. Janczyk has taken the concept a step further at Gettysburg. “We don’t cut a kid for a year if they go early decision. As a sophomore, junior and so on they have to make the cut, but they get a year to get used to the system and college in general guaranteed if they commit [early].”, he said. “If we are talking to a highly-recruited kid I feel like I have to commit to him if he commits to me”.

I asked Janczyk whether a kid is “marked” as a DI kid and then not approached by the DIII coaches. He said it’s not so structured but that’s close. He said “I see a kid and say ‘Boy I hope he’s around when it’s time to commit’, but he probably won’t be. And some kids just want to go DI no matter what. But for many, their chances of going to an NCAA tournament are better at the top DIII schools than the lower DI schools”.

I pressed him on this and asked what a school like Gettysburg can offer to kid that doesn’t make Scott Urick’s final roster, but is more likely to end up playing at the low to middle levels of DI. And they offer plenty. “They’ll get more playing time and there are the great academic features of a smaller school. Professors have students out to their houses for dinner and are lacrosse fans at a school like Gettysburg. We’re personally committed to the student’s academic future, too”, Janczyk said. “But we also want a kid who can’t imagine playing great college lacrosse without working hard at school and achieving in the classroom. Graduating with honors is more important than being an All-American here. Our senior All-Americans were all academic All-Americans last year too”.

I asked him what differences might be on the practice field. “At a small school like Gettysburg, we teach lacrosse and are committed to fundamentals," Janczyk said. "A kid might have a better chance of becoming a better player over the years than at a DI program where he is not starting. We train wall ball gurus and have a passion for training and practice. Sometimes, at a bigger school, that stuff is expected on your own time."

And Janczyk thinks many of his players could have gone DI. “Last year we had ten All-Americans, so we certainly get DI-caliber kids or bubble kids who wanted a different experience and a chance to play in a championship."

Finally, I asked Urick what makes for a good fall tournament and how they chose which ones to attend. He said that obviously the level of talent is important, but there was more to it than just that. “We pick tournaments with the most kids we are actively recruiting. And we prioritize on kids we need to make decisions on. In the fall, many tournaments have the same teams so the best are the ones who organize the best. Having the correct names and numbers is very important. The tournaments have gotten really good at providing info for us over the past few years. Proximity of fields to one another so you’re not wasting time going back and forth is a good thing."

Posted by John Weaver at 12:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

Are you starved for some great lacrosse or just want to see some hard-hitting action on a weeknight in Baltimore? Well, the Baltimore Indoor Lacrosse League (BILL) entered the playoffs this week and you can check out the action for free this Tuesday and Thursday, and next week as well. They play at the Du Burns Arena in Canton, where teams have squared off every Tuesday and Friday this season. I spoke the commissioner of the BILL, Hunter Francis, today, about the league and this week’s playoffs.

Francis, who was the co-commissioner from 2000-2005 and then again in 2008, still plays the game. He was the goalkeeper for Tricerat in the quarterfinals last week, and they lost to, of all people, the E-Lacrosse team, which will play the daunting Smartlink squad in the semis. Smartlink beat Sandy Point in the quarterfinals.

The league is chock full of college lacrosse stars. Players like Bugsy Combs, Spencer Ford, Ben DeFelice, Sean Nadelin, Casey Connor, Dan Morohl, Erik Miller, Kevin Huntley, Jake Byrne, Hunter Lochte and more. The E-Lacrosse team features the only woman who’s ever played in the National Lacrosse League in goalkeeper Ginny Capicchioni, and she’s darn good. According to Hunter, Dan Marohl, who plays for Tricerat, is the best player in league, but the MVP would be Smartlink’s Spencer Ford, if they had one.

The league is fortunate to have six NLL referees with lots of experience. Mike Ventura is the chief of referees. He was an NLL and World Indoor Lacrosse referee and goes back to the old Eagle Indoor Lacrosse League in the early 1980s.

This is the 24th year of the BILL. The league was started by Marc Hoffman and some others back in the day as a training league for the Eagle league. For the first ten years, the stars of the Baltimore Thunder and Washington Wave used the league to prepare for the Eagle seasons. The mission of the league is still to “expose great field players to the subtleties of box lacrosse," Francis says.

“This is the environment for our indigenous players to learn the game," Francis said. And there’s plenty to learn. The two-man game or breaking down defenses into two-on-one situations is a key in box lacrosse. In box there is a complete reliance on one hand. There’s no premium for playing with two hands. You’re a righty or a lefty. The accelerated pace is different and, of course, players in box lacrosse shoot on little goals with huge goalies (at least their pads are). Also, board play is a new experience for most, not just getting hit into one but reacting to errant passes and missed shots that remain in play. There are very few out-of-bounds balls in box lacrosse.

The BILL plays with modified NLL rules. There’s watered-down cross checking and boarding. This means that a player is allowed to cross check once during an encounter with an opposing player. In the NLL, you can do it over and over while defending against a player with the ball. Here, more than one cross check will get you some time in the penalty box. In the BILL, dasher marks are located three feet from the boards. They signify an area between them and the unforgiving wooden sideboards where the defender has to play the man. Outside of those dasher marks toward the open field area, the defender can play the man, which means hit his body with no intention of going for the ball.

Kevin Huntley represents the way the league works. “He’s a prime example of what the league is all about” Francis said. “He’s found his sea legs in the league and could take the NLL by storm as an impact player this year, if he plays."

Huntley runs on the Pickled Parrot squad with George Castle. Francis also bets that George Castle will make the Philadelphia Wings squad this year. Dan Marohl was traded by the Wings to the Minnesota Swarm this year and according to Francis is the best American box player by far. The NLL training camps started during the past week or so and out of 139 BILL players, 13 were invited to camp and 10 are already with a team.

There are only three such leagues in the country as far as I know, with the BILL being the top preparatory experience for the NLL. The Philadelphia Indoor Lacrosse League and Washington Metropolitan Box Lacrosse League, which is run by a friend of mine, Marty Joiner, have been formed more recently.

Hunter thinks the playoffs will be as exciting as ever this year, but that one team, Smartlink, has a good chance of winning it all. Smartlink has won three BILL championships in a row. E-lacrosse lost to them in the finals in 2007 and 2006. In fact, Smartlink has only lost once in four years, and that was with short numbers against Dewalt this year. They are 48-1 in the past four years. “They move the ball so well,” says the commish. “They are big and physical. Zach Burke, Sean Nadelin and Casey Connor are easily the best defense. Bugsy is a spectacular shooter and Spencer Ford is the playmaker. Smartlink is really good."

Two teams have won five straight championships in the history of the BILL, LaxWorld in the 1980s and Rebel Lacrosse Wear in the '90s. One team that may give Smartlink trouble is the Pickled Parrot. The Parrot lost 11-9 to Smartlink this season and with Huntley coming on strong lately, the final could be great if that’s the matchup.

The remaining quarterfinals will be played this Tuesday at 6 p.m. DeWalt plays the Baltimore Lacrosse Club in the first matchup and Cummings & Company plays the Pickled Parrot for the last semifinal slot at 7 p.m. The winners will play Thursday night at 6. Smartlink and E-Lacrosse will play in the other semifinal. “The semis are always barn burners,” Francis said.

The finals are Nov. 25 at 6:45 p.m. at Du Burns Arena. Attendance to all games is free.

The Pickled Parrot bar and restaurant, not coincidentally, is only a block away and is the watering hole for the league. Spectators are invited to join the teams after the games for beverages and some great food every week including the playoffs. See you out there!

Posted by John Weaver at 1:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

The one thing most Hall of Fame inductees have in common is that they understand that the individual accolade they are receiving reflects upon and also celebrates their teams. Even the referees that are inducted thank those who worked the field with them, knowing that the game of lacrosse, even the officiating of it cannot be done at the highest level without a team effort. Certainly the game cannot be played at the championship level without a solid team, full of sacrifice and role playing. Each of the inductees usually sees themselves as a metaphor of sorts -- a representative from that team effort. In the case of George Tracy, a recent inductee for his play at the Naval Academy in 1961, '62 and '63 -- all national-championship efforts and All-American seasons for Tracy -- he emphatically declared that his award was for the whole team, many in attendance Saturday night at the National Lacrosse Hall of Fame ceremonies at the Grand Lodge in Hunt Valley, Md.

When George "Trace" Tracy was a kid, he attended Loyola High School in Baltimore. Loyola had no lacrosse team then, but Tracy still had a lacrosse stick. The stresses of school and a kid’s life were wiped away daily with two hours or so of wall-ball drills, so while not playing officially, he was honing his skills with the stick. He would eventually join the Baltimore Lacrosse Club and then the Maryland Lacrosse Club, mostly populated with post-collegiate players. He was not as big or strong as his teammates or opponents, but he held his own. He broke his leg playing hockey and missed a year but otherwise, he could be found hitchhiking (at the time, it was a common occurrence) to practices and games for the clubs. He was a midfielder – all of his heroes were middies and playing attack was not even an option as far as he was concerned.

Tracy's grades were good and he landed at Johns Hopkins, where he played a little as a midfielder. This was his first play with a consistent team, but Hopkins was academically and financially challenging and he left after the year. He knew he had to work harder on academics and he could overcome that obstacle, but his family was burdened by the tuition and he did not like that. He attempted to get an appointment to the Naval Academy.

Tracy was very disappointed when he did not do well enough on the entrance exams to get a full appointment to the academy. He really had to make a decision about where he would take his life from there. He knew he wanted to do two things: play lacrosse at Naval Academy and serve in the Navy. He didn’t want to be an enlisted man "scraping paint off of the ship’s decks," but he took the chance of exactly that happening when he enlisted with the hopes of taking the entrance exam for the Naval Academy Preparatory School.

Tracy was very happy to pass those tests and the year at the prep school was important to his development. The coach, Cecil Perkins, was a wonderful coach but coached many sports and was not a master of lacrosse. Perkins relied on the kids to help each other and while Tracy received some good help from others, he also helped his teammates hone their stick skills and offensive game. He had picked up quite a bit from his cousins, the famous Corrigan lacrosse family in Baltimore and from people like Bob Scott at Hopkins.

At Navy Prep, he started becoming the leader he would eventually prove to be while also becoming pretty savvy on the field. They had a great season and he did well academically. The staff at Navy Prep prepared the kids specifically for the tests they would have to take to get into the service academies and Tracy was far more prepared when he tested again for an appointment to Navy. If he had been unsuccessful in this bid, he says he would have landed at Loyola College on a scholarship because of his improved grades. "I left everything on the field, academically," George remembers. Having enlisted, he would have been a Navy ROTC candidate even at Loyola, but he passed his tests and received an appointment to the academy. His dream was starting to come together. He had confidence and a solid work ethic heading into the next stage: his plebe year.

Tracy was a middie for the Navy plebe team. In those days, no plebe (freshman) played on the varsity squad. He had a great plebe season while watching the 1960 varsity class win the championship. It was the beginning of the "Decade of Domination," when Navy won or shared eight consecutive USILA national titles from 1960-67. When he moved up to varsity as a sophomore, he was switched to attack by the coach, Hall of Famer Willis Bilderback and offensive assistant Dick Corrigan, Tracy’s Hall of Fame presenter Saturday.

“I didn’t care where they put me as long as I was on the field," he said. "I’d have played goalie." His Navy coaches “got us to discover ourselves and produce on the field," Tracy said. "'Bildy' was a mild-mannered man, but had a fire burning in him."

Buster Phipps and Dick Corrigan, the assistant coaches, were each experts in their areas. The staff was very a close group and very passionate. They cared for the kids and Tracy remembers these years fondly. Of course, they were also championship seasons. Corrigan and Phipps had been stars at the University of Maryland. Corrigan, also Tracy’s first cousin, had been a great attackman and even won a championship at Maryland in 1955. He went off to do a stint in the Army between his starring years at Maryland, returning for his senior year, when he won the Turnbull award (1958) and scored an incredible nine goals against Navy. As a coach at Navy, Corrigan was part of four national championships in five years. Tracy was proud to play for his cousin and to this day looks to him for inspiration and leadership.

Tracy’s game on attack at Navy was unique and dominating. He scored despite being covered. He laid out defensemen. He liked the real hard cut. He’d carry the 'D' man in one direction, then drive back across their body and shoot. He played with both hands when most did not, especially defensemen. His stick skills were second to none and his conditioning was unmatched. Though not in the varsity boxing program, he developed a boxing workout routine. He punched a light bag and skipped rope obsessively. He’d sneak into the squash courts with teammates and they’d vigorously throw games of catch in there. “In the sessions at the squash courts, the ball couldn’t get away from you. You’d either develop stick skills or go to the infirmary, Tracy remembers.

Those three teams from 1961-63 were champions. During those years, Navy amassed a 27-4 (.871) record and swept powerhouses Johns Hopkins, Virginia, Maryland and Princeton. Tracy was selected by his teammates as captain in 1963 and scored 3 goals in the North-South Senior All-Star Game. He was awarded the Stuart Oxnard Miller Memorial Lacrosse Cup as the team’s MVP. He has been inducted into the USNA Athletic and US Lacrosse Greater Baltimore Chapter halls of fame, as well.

I asked Tracy if the kids on the team in 1963 could see the war building and if they were nervous about their eventual inclusion. He said that the plebe year was so tough and built such discipline and confidence that, other than the rigorous academics, they were not intimidated by much at that age and time in their lives. The first year at Navy is designed to break down each young man so that they can be part of a team that can fight a war unselfishly and effectively. And physically, they were prepared for anything. Boxing and wrestling was a part of every student’s life at Navy and as a lacrosse player, wind sprints before and after practice were always accompanied by a three-mile run to Hospital Point and back before practice’s end.

Because of this physical conditioning and youthful naiveté and exuberance, the team wasn’t afraid of going off to war. Most considered the inevitability of going to war as just part of their commitment to the Navy and their country. Tracy says they were young and full of adventure and "frankly not smart enough to be scared."

The class of '63 went their separate ways. George shipped out to California and was getting his ship ready to go to Vietnam when he began playing in the burgeoning California club league for the Temple City Chiefs. The Chiefs were formed by a Canadian, Al Saviano. Serving on a Destroyer from 1963 until '66 and then as an executive officer of a landing ship tank, leading up to 90 men, Tracy's assignments had him in and out of ports in California, where he continued to play when he could. These clubs were really the start of lacrosse in the west. Teammates Tommy Mitchell and Karl Ripplemeyer both promoted lacrosse for years in California and are, even now, growing the game in Las Vegas. Brian Lantier, a 1965 Navy grad, settled in northern California and started clubs there. They even started a north-south California game, played by some of the college game’s biggest star alumnae, many from the service academies, but also businessmen who had moved west for various reasons. They once played a demonstration game at halftime of a Rams football game. In total, Tracy played for 15 years on the club level in five different states and was also a member of The Collegians, the 1962 Maryland Box Lacrosse Champions on the televised box lacrosse league in Maryland.

Yesterday, while speaking with Tracy, who was awarded the Navy Commendation Medal, Vietnam Service Medal (three stars) and the National Defense Service Medal, he made it clear that his induction is a representation of the success of all of his teammates and teams at Navy. But he also said that, on this Veterans Day, so aptly near to the date of his induction, some others, who left those championship teams of the 1960s to enter the Vietnam War immediately, and did not come back are also deserve recognition. They represent the boys who chose and still choose service academies over the party life at most colleges, with duty in their hearts, especially at a time of war.

Two of these men were Donald MacLaughlin and Jack Prudhomme. They played lacrosse with Tracy and were heroic on the field, but they will be remembered primarily, unfortunately, for their sacrifice to our nation. The national Midfielder of the Year award is named after MacLaughlin. Both served during the Vietnam War, like all of those 1960s Navy lacrosse players did in some way, but these two did not return.

On Dec. 22, 1965, an A4C airplane piloted by Lieutenant John D. Prudhomme flew from the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise with one hundred aircrafts to attack a thermal power plant in Uong Bi, Vietnam, which is located fifteen miles north-northeast of the city of Haiphong. The mission was successful, destroying the plant. But Prudhomme's plane was hit by enemy fire and crashed. Prudhomme was considered to have been killed in the crash. He is listed among the missing because his remains were not recovered.

Eleven days later on Jan. 2, 1966, the USS Enterprise launched a number of missions in support of Allied forces south of the demilitarized zone. LTJG Don MacLaughlin was flying in A4C as well. The mission was directed against a storage site near Duc Pho, Quang Ngai Province. Conditions were poor with low clouds and fog. At some point radio contact with MacLaughlin was lost. The wreckage of MacLaughlin's plane was found on a nearby mountainside, but efforts to recover MacLaughlin's body were unsuccessful due to enemy presence.

Both of these men not only represent those kids at Navy past and present that serve, but all of those who served and sacrificed from among our lacrosse ranks, whether they went to West Point or the Citadel, VMI or the Coast Guard Academy, the Air Force Academy or the Johns Hopkins ROTC program. On Veterans Day, all lacrosse players should think of these men (and now women, too) and others who have paid a considerable price, one way or the other, for our freedom and continued prosperity.

And, of course, they are joined in their sacrifice by many who never played the game. Tracy’s brother-in-law, his wife's brother, 2nd Lieutenant Lloyd Chisholm Runnels, USMC, never lived to see a lacrosse game or celebrate the wonderful occasion of Tracy’s Hall of Fame induction. He died in Vietnam the day before Thanksgiving in 1967. “He was a special guy,” Tracy said.

George Tracy enjoys the Native American history and tradition of the game, like any true fan. After serving in a war and reflecting on that experience, he has a special appreciation for the game’s origins of preparation for war but also as an alternative to war used by the early Iroquois to settle disputes between groups. Lacrosse is George Tracy’s game for so many reasons. And lacrosse is most honored to have had men like George Tracy, Dick Corrigan, Don MacLaughlin and Jack Prudhomme play the game at the highest levels. On this Veterans Day we honor them all like we did George Tracy Saturday night.

Posted by John Weaver at 2:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

The National Recruiting Fall Ball Tournament will be held Sunday at St. Paul's School. This is the seventh year of the tournament and it is a great one. It started in 2002 with about 24 teams and now has 50 teams. The fall recruiting period for college coaches is a short one so they cluster around the good tournaments rich with talent. Between 70 and 80 college coaches attend the National Recruiting Fall Ball Tournament each year, walking from field to field with clipboards and roster notebooks in hand.

I spoke to Ray Schulmeyer, the tournament’s organizer today and he’s proud that each year they have players that commit to colleges at the tournament or immediately after the tournament. It really works for these kids and the coaches. I have witnessed players actually make a name for themselves at this event. The players are a good mix, from talented freshman wanting to be noticed early to seniors playing for the last time before they commit, as well as some serious blue chip kids that already know where they are going, who will play at major college programs.

Schulmeyer says they’ve had teams from as far as Florida and Texas. This year they have two teams from Burnaby Mountain, British Columbia. There is no playoff or champion of the tournament. The structure is designed to just showcase the participants to the recruiting coaches and you if you want to attend. There is no charge and its great lacrosse. St. Paul’s has plenty of parking so come on out. Games are scheduled from 8-4:20 p.m. There will be eight fields going constantly.

Here’s a list of the teams that are competing Sunday. In the “A” division, the competitors will be Alexandria Travel, All State, Archbishop Curley, Bishop Shanahan High School, Breakers, Bucks Select, Burnaby Mountain Selects Junior Elite, Burnaby Mountain Selects Senior Elite, Burning River Lacrosse Maroon, Celts Lacrosse Club, Central PA Dawgs, Delaware Silverbacks Elite, FuZe Blue, FuZe Gold, Greene Turtle OC, Hot Shots Lacrosse Club, Jagslax, LB3 Blue, LI Lax, Long Island Storm, Meltdown Lancaster Select, Mesa Fresh 2010, Morris Select, North Arundel Gold, Penn East, Potomac School, Rebel Elite, Renegades Gold, SMS Lacrosse, Springfield High School, St. Paul’s, Team Langley, Thomas S. Wooton HS, Trilogy NJ, Vipers Elite and West Chester East High School.

In the “B” division, you’ll see A.O.D. Richmond, Blue Mountain, Burning River Lacrosse Navy, Downingtown West PA, FuZe Select, FuZe White, Harford Renegades (Betsill), LB3 Silver, LB3 White, Long Island Saints, Madlax Sophomores, North Arundel White, St. Paul’s I, St. Paul’s II, Team Charlotte Orange and Trilogy.

As you can see, there will be plenty of teams from all over and these kids will be playing for spots on college teams. For most of them, that is their dream come true, so the action is intense. I hope to see you out there!

Note: For women's lacrosse fans, another tournament with many high school girls teams will be played at St. Paul's the day before, on Saturday, as well. With these two and the Hall of Fame ceremony in Hunt Valley on Saturday night, it's a hot lacrosse weekend in Baltimore, whatever the weather.

Posted by John Weaver at 7:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

About eight years ago, I was sitting in a doctor’s examining room waiting for the doctor to come in for my annual check-up. I had been in this room with time to kill before and had already memorized the clippings of funny doctor-related cartoon clippings tacked to a cork board and the various degrees posted on the wall attesting to my physician’s academic accomplishments and accreditation. But I’d never read the calligraphic document which was framed on the back of the door. Perhaps the door had never been shut before while I was waiting or perhaps the calligraphy and poetic posturing of the words in verse turned me off like required reading at school, but this time I noticed it and out of sheer boredom looked closer. At the top of the verses it said “from a document found at Old Saint Paul's Church, Baltimore A.D. 1692”. Being from Baltimore I decided to read on for at least another sentence or two. It read:

"Go placidly amid the noise and the haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence. As far as possible without surrender be on good terms with all persons. Speak your truth quietly and clearly; and listen to others..."

I was stunned. The verse actually made sense and was helpful to me. I thought it to be like combination of religion and grandfatherly advice; like a bible verse with a bit of Kahlil Gibran, Henry David Thoreau, and even Dale Carnegie thrown in. I read on and it changed my life. You can read the poem in its entirety here and I highly recommend it.

I had the doctor write the word “Desiderata” on a prescription note for me -- appropriate, though I did not think of that at the time. He mentioned that he thought it was really written by a more modern poet than the calligraphy on the door had noted. I told him I would look it up on the web and let him know the next time I saw him.

He was right. The author was Max Ehrmann, a poet and lawyer from Indiana, who died in 1945. The confusion about its origin came from a printing of the poem in a pamphlet handed out at Saint Paul's Church in Baltimore in 1959. The Reverend Frederick Kates, rector of the historic Maryland church, had simply noted at the top of the pamphlet the church’s origin “Old Saint Paul's Church, Baltimore A.D. 1692." The church was erected in 1692. Over the years the pamphlet was copied and passed from person to person because the words carried such meaning to the readers. Eventually the rumor that accompanied the verses was that the document had been discovered during the building of the church and that it must be even older than that date.

The actual writer, Max Ehrmann, never enjoyed much notoriety while living and the verse was not well known when it was initially published. It is said that when Adlai Stevenson, a great leader of the Democratic Party, died in the 1960s, the Desiderata was to be included in his Christmas cards the following winter. The press took hold of that and the notation of the Church's establishment mistaking the origin, popularizing the verses as ancient and worthy after never noticing them while Ehrmann was alive.

The verses are alive and well today and as popular as ever, though you may not have read them. Who reads poetry these days? In fact, someone in nearly every profession or popular hobby has adapted it to their specific interest. There are now hundreds of references to the Ehrmann writing all over the world, all meaningful to some group or another. I discovered this the day I got home from the doctor’s office. I looked up the Desiderata and found it easily. But the one I began reading was somehow different that the one on the doctor’s door. It said things that pertained to flying. It turned out to be the adaptation for pilots. I kept searching and found one for Cub Scouts and then one for bureaucrats. There’s even one now for video gamers. I finally found the original online and printed a copy for myself.

This literary work by Ehrmann and the poem entitled “If”, just one brilliant work by Rudyard Kipling, the author of a popular children's’ favorite, "The Jungle Book," are the most influential writings in my life. Another of Kipling's works, "The Law of the Jungle," should also be used by coaches of every sport as he ensures that, “For the strength of the Pack is the Wolf, and the strength of the Wolf is the Pack."

A couple years later I came across a rather amateur, even absurd rendition of the poem for Star Trek fans posted on a hotel wall which must have hosted a Trekkie convention some days before my arrival. All at once I abhorred the juvenile and fanciful facsimile of the original and then accepted the challenge to myself to do better (much better) adapting a version for the passion in my life -- the sport of lacrosse. It took a few months to perfect before I released it on E-Lacrosse, titling it self-indulgently, "The E-Laxerata."

I had no idea what to expect. A lacrosse poem? But within weeks I had requests from more than 100 coaches and lacrosse programs to use it for various purposes and even a publication wanting to reprint it. I was blown away. Since that time it has now appeared in the programs for hundreds of school teams. It is a permanent fixture on the locker room walls of at least 40 lacrosse-playing schools that I know of. It has been etched on trophies and plaques. It has been read for motivation from the highest to the lowest levels of the game by coaches to their charges before big wins and after big losses.

Every once in a while I read it again myself to find my way in the sport and the industry of lacrosse again. My version just speaks to the game of lacrosse, but I like to think Mr. Ehrmann would be proud of the adaptation of his immortal verses. At every Hall of Fame ceremony I have attended, and at that time of year (the ceremony is next week), I usually think that the honorees lived up to the challenge in the words. For our game is one of competing but sharing; rivalry but camaraderie; aggression but courtesy; achievement but appreciation of others. I love the game, and for all that I may have given to the game with E-Lacrosse for more than 11 years now, founding two very good lacrosse programs and helping with countless others, this adaptation of the words on my physician’s door may be the best thing I ever have done for the sport of lacrosse. Of it I am most humbly proud.

Here it is for your enjoyment during this Hall of Fame week:

THE E-LAXERATA

Walk silently onto clamorous fields, and remember the advantage that comes from quiet confidence. As best you can, without surrender, be of good will toward all opponents. Win quietly and decisively; and honor all teams and players, even those who are of lesser skill and experience. They too love the game. Avoid loud and unsportsmanlike people. They are vexations to the spirit of Lacrosse.

If you compare your game or success with others, you may become vain or bitter; for always there will be greater and lesser players than yourself. Enjoy the wins as well as personal achievements in the game. Be aware of every success as you learn and play the game, however small; those moments will always be yours in the changing fortunes of teams and players.

Exercise caution when choosing heroes, assigning loyalties or believing rumors, for the world is full of trickery. But let not this blind you to what virtue there is; many persons strive for high ideals, the game is full of heroism and honesty. Play your game. Accept winning and its rewards. Don't be afraid to lose, for as important as any game is there will almost always be another. As you get older use your experience to dominate, gracefully surrendering the speed and strength of youth.

Nurture strength of spirit needed to lose even the biggest games with class and dignity. But never expect to lose. Many games are lost before they are played. Beyond trying as hard as you can all of the time, don't take losing to heart. You are a lacrosse player, no less than any; you have a right to be on the field. And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the experience of every victory and defeat will make you a better player and a better person.

Therefore, be at peace with the game, whatever you conceive it to be. And whatever your labors and aspirations in lacrosse, keep anchored in your family, education and career. For as much as we love the game, after devastating injury or loss, it's important to already know that there's more to life than lacrosse. Play hard.

Enjoy the game.

Posted by John Weaver at 6:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)