By now, most readers of this blog will have heard that Bill Tierney is leaving Princeton to head to the University of Denver. Let's discuss the some of many points surrounding this move.
First, why Coach Tierney left. No one with the sophistication of Bill Tierney makes a move like this for a single reason. We can start with the rumored 250,000 reasons and just put those aside for the moment. Tierney has family in that area and might be able to hire his son, Trevor, as an assistant. Coach Tierney is also 57 years old and if he ever wanted to make a move like this, there are not many years left to do so.
Let's stick on that age issue for a moment as well. Does anyone know what these numbers represent in Ivy League lacrosse: 39, 40, 41? Those are the approximate ages of Jeff Tambroni, John Tillman and Lars Tiffany. Bill Tierney found himself competing directly against three GenX coaches on the rise in his own conference. And if he looked around lacrosse Tierney would find lots of other coaches on the other side of 50 -- Pietromala, Breschi, Cassese, Toomey, Fedorjaka, Myers and Marr just to name a few. I have litle doubt that Bill Tierney was confident in his ability to compete against coaches a generation his junior. But he also probably recognized that his margin for error was decreasing with so many talented younger coaches emerging on the scene.
Going to Denver was a game-changing move. We can debate the various tribal differences between the eastern lacrosse schools, but they are virtually cookie-cutter copies when compared to Denver. Tierney now gets to engage in the college lacrosse equivalent of asymmetrical warfare at Denver. Rather than chasing the same guys from some exit off I-95, I-90 or the LIE, Tierney will be digging for the players from the rest of the lacrosse universe as an icon in the sport. It will make for a different challenge for a person who likes them.
Second, what does this mean for Princeton? Simply put, rarely does an icon move from a program and his successor finds the same level of success. The passing of the torch from Simmons to Desko is one of the few instances I can name. Either it takes the new coach a few years to get the program up to speed or it takes the program a few coaches to find the right fit. Fortunately, whoever takes over at Princeton will inherit a team that is absolutely stacked. Unfortunately, for lots of underclassmen, Princeton just went from a very known and familiar program to an unknown one.
Third, what does this mean for the rest of college lacrosse? I would focus on a couple of things. For one, Tierney's mere presence out west jump-starts the expansion and growth of the sport outside the hotbeds. There is also the inevitable reshuffling of the coaching deck. Someone will get the Dartmouth and Princeton jobs and leave two positions open that must be filled. As always, there will be a ripple effect as coaches move around.
Lastly, this should be a reminder to everyone in all college sports that any coach can decide he or she sees a greener pasture somewhere. With luck you will have the same coaches from the time that you arrive at a school until you leave, but the odds are against it.
Monday, June 8, 2009
Why I Love This Part Of The Season
Leaves are on the trees, sandals are on the feet. Class, group and state champions are being crowned. The spring lacrosse season is ending. Everyone gets to take a little mental break and assess where we are.
For the teams that achieved their goals, congratulations. There is nothing like the feeling of setting out to accomplish something, working hard at it, and achieving it. In lacrosse, that often means an equipment garage sale on the field at the end of a game. Smiles abound on sweaty faces as friends and family beam at the accomplishment. When you achieve these things, they stay with you for all time. No one can take your accomplishments away; years from now you still can look back at the day that you won your town the race.
For those who fell short of their goals, congratulations as well. I heard an expression once that failure is just a form of feedback. I know in my life I have learned a lot more from the things that didn't go as I would hoped than I have from the outright successes. Constant success is mostly a sign of not setting goals high enough. Now is a chance to look back and think about what went wrong. Did we not have enough talent? Did we use our talent poorly? Did we not work hard enough? Did we not gel as a team? Which parts of our game let us down?
In lacrosse, the end of the spring season just means that there is another couple months to play. We toss aside our school/town gear, grab our summer club gear, and apply sunscreen. I was able to check out a couple introductory meetings for summer teams recently. The players and parents meeting their new coaches and teammates is like the beginning of a second act in a play. It feels like a new beginning, but it's usually more like a mulligan in golf. Most players didn't have the spring that they wanted and hope to redeem themselves a bit in the summer. Those folks are hungry and ready for a new start. We won't forget what happened before but we might be able to focus on what we can fix this time.
I am hitting a few tournaments this summer and will post reviews afterward. If you happen to go to a tournament and want to send me some feedback, feel free. I enjoy hearing from readers and maybe we can do some guests spots.
For the teams that achieved their goals, congratulations. There is nothing like the feeling of setting out to accomplish something, working hard at it, and achieving it. In lacrosse, that often means an equipment garage sale on the field at the end of a game. Smiles abound on sweaty faces as friends and family beam at the accomplishment. When you achieve these things, they stay with you for all time. No one can take your accomplishments away; years from now you still can look back at the day that you won your town the race.
For those who fell short of their goals, congratulations as well. I heard an expression once that failure is just a form of feedback. I know in my life I have learned a lot more from the things that didn't go as I would hoped than I have from the outright successes. Constant success is mostly a sign of not setting goals high enough. Now is a chance to look back and think about what went wrong. Did we not have enough talent? Did we use our talent poorly? Did we not work hard enough? Did we not gel as a team? Which parts of our game let us down?
In lacrosse, the end of the spring season just means that there is another couple months to play. We toss aside our school/town gear, grab our summer club gear, and apply sunscreen. I was able to check out a couple introductory meetings for summer teams recently. The players and parents meeting their new coaches and teammates is like the beginning of a second act in a play. It feels like a new beginning, but it's usually more like a mulligan in golf. Most players didn't have the spring that they wanted and hope to redeem themselves a bit in the summer. Those folks are hungry and ready for a new start. We won't forget what happened before but we might be able to focus on what we can fix this time.
I am hitting a few tournaments this summer and will post reviews afterward. If you happen to go to a tournament and want to send me some feedback, feel free. I enjoy hearing from readers and maybe we can do some guests spots.
Tuesday, June 2, 2009
Diversity in Lacrosse -- The Road To Be More Traveled
This is an article last week in the Times Herald-Record, a newspaper from New York's Hudson Valley, talking about diversity in lacrosse. The article correctly observed that lacrosse is not as diverse as anyone would like but was casual about some of the facts that it cited. I thought about writing a post about some of my complaints about the article but I decided against it. Instead it might be better to talk about diversity in lacrosse and also in sports generally.
Here is a story from my daughter's high school English class: Her English teacher was trying make a point about the lack of diversity in many sports. The teacher started talking about how "You never see black athletes playing [insert sport here]." The teacher started with hockey but a couple hockey players in the class started rattling off names like Anson Carter, Mike Grier, and Ray Emery. She then tried with swimming but a swimmer in the class started rattling off names like Cullen Jones, Anthony Earvin, and Maritza Correia. She then went with lacrosse and the lacrosse players started talking about Kyle Harrison, John Christmas, Will Barrow and the Brattons. It wasn't that long ago that very few names would roll off the tongue when asked to name non-white athletes in those sports.
As late as the 1990 World Cup, the U.S. Men's soccer team had one or two non-white starters. These days, we start twice that many at least. Here is how we looked in 2006 before one of our World Cup games. Progress on these fronts occurring; it rarely comes as quickly as we like but it comes nevertheless.
I agree with the perspective in the article that iconic figures in the sport are unlikely to affect diversity in a sport in a lasting way. Of course, everyone wants to be able to look up and relate to the best players in a sport. But there are so many ways in which to emulate a great athlete that are beyond ethnicity. We already have a number of prominent African-American lacrosse players and have for maybe a decade now. Frankly I am unconvinced that making the sport marginally more diverse at the upper levels of the sport really attracts much diversity. After all, when a school-age kid is learning how to pick up a ground ball on a cold day in March, what does he care whether a couple of famous brothers who have a similar hue to their skin color do the same at the University of Virginia?
That young kid does care, however, whether his friends play the sport and whether his coaches are supporting his effort to learn the game. In my experience, kids like playing the sports that their friends play and where they get positive reinforcement from the adults in charge. As the parent of a lacrosse player, I have seen the full spectrum of coaching abilities from the phenomenal to the pitiful. And I know that were it not for a few encouraging words at the beginning of this journey from a head coach to a young guy living with me, the journey would have ended the same month that it started. The most we can do to promote diversity in the sport is to view every kid -- regardless of his size, strength, speed, family income, intelligence level, toughness, religion, ethnicity or God knows whatever else -- as a potential lacrosse player and future ambassador for the sport. If we continue to grow the game, it will grow in all directions and we all will better for it.
Here is a story from my daughter's high school English class: Her English teacher was trying make a point about the lack of diversity in many sports. The teacher started talking about how "You never see black athletes playing [insert sport here]." The teacher started with hockey but a couple hockey players in the class started rattling off names like Anson Carter, Mike Grier, and Ray Emery. She then tried with swimming but a swimmer in the class started rattling off names like Cullen Jones, Anthony Earvin, and Maritza Correia. She then went with lacrosse and the lacrosse players started talking about Kyle Harrison, John Christmas, Will Barrow and the Brattons. It wasn't that long ago that very few names would roll off the tongue when asked to name non-white athletes in those sports.
As late as the 1990 World Cup, the U.S. Men's soccer team had one or two non-white starters. These days, we start twice that many at least. Here is how we looked in 2006 before one of our World Cup games. Progress on these fronts occurring; it rarely comes as quickly as we like but it comes nevertheless.I agree with the perspective in the article that iconic figures in the sport are unlikely to affect diversity in a sport in a lasting way. Of course, everyone wants to be able to look up and relate to the best players in a sport. But there are so many ways in which to emulate a great athlete that are beyond ethnicity. We already have a number of prominent African-American lacrosse players and have for maybe a decade now. Frankly I am unconvinced that making the sport marginally more diverse at the upper levels of the sport really attracts much diversity. After all, when a school-age kid is learning how to pick up a ground ball on a cold day in March, what does he care whether a couple of famous brothers who have a similar hue to their skin color do the same at the University of Virginia?
That young kid does care, however, whether his friends play the sport and whether his coaches are supporting his effort to learn the game. In my experience, kids like playing the sports that their friends play and where they get positive reinforcement from the adults in charge. As the parent of a lacrosse player, I have seen the full spectrum of coaching abilities from the phenomenal to the pitiful. And I know that were it not for a few encouraging words at the beginning of this journey from a head coach to a young guy living with me, the journey would have ended the same month that it started. The most we can do to promote diversity in the sport is to view every kid -- regardless of his size, strength, speed, family income, intelligence level, toughness, religion, ethnicity or God knows whatever else -- as a potential lacrosse player and future ambassador for the sport. If we continue to grow the game, it will grow in all directions and we all will better for it.
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