Midwestern lacrosse, an emerging phenomenon
By William Strome, Staff Writer
June 11, 2008 | 3 p.m.
Considered by many to be just an East Coast sport, lacrosse has swept through the Midwest like a current with a forcible undertow.
For the first time in 37 years since the NCAA began holding the men’s lacrosse championship in 1971, three teams from the Midwest earned bids to the big dance. The University of Notre Dame earned the regular season Great Western Lacrosse League title and was joined by The Ohio State University and the University of Denver as at-large bids in the 2008 16-team tournament.
Of the three, none advanced beyond the quarterfinals, and in the tournament's history, no Midwest team has even played in the national title game at the Division I level.
That was then, this is now.
Formerly dominated by East Coast schools, Midwestern lacrosse is on the rise, and it could not be any more prevalent than at the high school level. The Ohio High School Lacrosse Association now has 93 programs under its belt, a number that continues to grow on a yearly basis.
“Back ten or 15 years ago if you were playing in this league you knew everybody: coaches, players and officials,” said 13-year Hudson High School coach Dave Blue. “Now the feel is much different, and with that has come a better level of lacrosse in this area.”
So why has a sport that has been played in America since the 1700s just starting to gain popularity now?
“The speed and physical style of play is what lures athletes in,” said Brad Jones, third-year Chagrin High School coach and former Ohio State attackman. “Lacrosse is finally starting to establish itself as a mainstream sport.”
Currently on a quest for his eleventh state title, Upper Arlington High School coach Ted Wolford believes it to be the exposure that is accountable for the recent increase in national acclaim.
“The more these kids start to see the game, the more they fall in love with it,” Wolford said. “The visibility of the sport has gone up dramatically and in turn, so has the number of kids coming out to play.”
But numbers do not necessarily translate into a solid lacrosse program.
“The biggest difference between the top teams in this area and everyone else is the youth programs available,” Cleveland St. Ignatius High School coach Woody Calleri said.
Jones concurs. “The more established programs have the feeder programs,” he said. “There is a considerable drop-off in the overall talent level after the top teams in the Midwest like Upper Arlington and Brother Rice who can compete with the best of the East Coast. For more teams in this area to move up to that level, the programs need the cooperation and active participation from the school to treat the program like a varsity one.”
Even though the Midwest may only produce one or two top teams consistently ranked nationally on LaxPower.com, players from all teams are starting to make to find homes with the top NCAA Division I teams in the nation.
“Coaches are starting to see the upside potential with players from the Midwest,” Cincinnati Moeller High School coach Tom Kennedy said. “The average Midwestern athlete is tougher but lacks the fundamentals. When coaches are debating between two guys, one from the East Coast who had been playing his whole life and one from the Midwest who has only been playing for a few years, they will lean toward the Midwestern athlete because of all that potential.”
For years, assuming Midwest lacrosse was just football players running around with sticks, East Coasters are finally starting to respect those to the west.
“Honestly, every time we’ve done an East Coast trip we’ve never lost,” Blue said. “When we first started making trips everyone was surprised how talented we were but never how athletic the players were. Now, no teams are surprised with how strong the Midwest teams have become. “
Not only are the East Coast trips essential to see a different style of play but most notably to gain recruitment exposure.
“When we go east we always hope for our kids to get a few college looks,” Wolford said. “But I always push the guys to do more recruitment stuff on their own, like contacting coaches and sending them game films.”
Jones feels it is all about communication for getting those big-school looks. “Contacting the coach and letting him know you’re interested is step one,” he said. “On campus visits, try to get an interview with the coach. The more the kids try to sell themselves to coaches, typically the more serious that coach will consider that player.”
Even with some of the Midwest’s best getting looks from all over the Division I scene, players are leaning toward the glorified East Coast schools.
“All the recruits I’ve had look for education first then playing lacrosse second,” Wolford said. “The natural attraction is always to the highly publicized schools. With such schools like Maryland, Virginia and Johns Hopkins getting all the glamorized press, it is easy to see why kids would want to play there.”
As the game itself becomes more and more popular on a yearly basis, so does the talent level in the Midwest. Already notorious as a high school football hotbed, the Midwest has embraced the game of lacrosse and has slowly but surely established itself on the national level.
---