BELLEVUE, Wash. – For Newport High School senior Justin Lau, signing a National Letter of Intent to play NCAA lacrosse is only half the battle. Pulling it all together to lead by example is what drives him.

Lau is just the second student-athlete from Newport, a Bellevue School District high school east of Seattle, to move on to the NCAA level in lacrosse by signing a National Letter of Intent to play at the University of Mount Olive in North Carolina.

And he’s just one of four Knights this year, joining highly touted football offensive lineman Calvin Throckmorton (Oregon), golfer Marianne Li (California) and baseball shortstop Ethan Paul (Vanderbilt) to sign an NLI. Sean Sterberg, a 2013 Newport graduate, plays lacrosse for NCAA Div. III Whittier College in California.

“I’m honestly shocked to have this opportunity,” said Lau who led the Newport lacrosse team in faceoffs last spring and this fall helped the Knights football squad advance to the WIAA quarterfinals before falling to eventual 4A state champion Bothell High School in the Gridiron Classic. “Playing for a rising team in D2 is pretty crazy,” he said. “I want to make the most of it.”

A standout in both sports, Lau is the second Washington state student-athlete this fall to commit to the Division II school southeast of the Raleigh-Durham area. Two weeks ago Tahoma High School senior Brody Sullivan verbally committed to play lacrosse for the Spartans.

Following graduation this spring, Lau will join a Mike Murphy coached lacrosse squad that is already stacked with 10 Washington state players including its upcoming 2015 freshman class that now includes five from the Evergreen state.

After Murphy led Mount Olive in its 2013 inaugural NCAA season with a .500 record, Lau sees it as a privilege to play for the coach who earned 2014 Conference Carolinas Coach of The Year honors after finishing with a 13-3 record and advancing to the conference championship game.

“No doubt,” said Lau who looked at 10 NCAA programs mostly at the Div. II and III levels before settling on Mount Olive.

“It’s small enough where everyone knows everyone else,” said Lau who plans to study business. “Having (Murphy) give me a shot was the best thing athletically that’s every happened to me.”

But the 6-1, 170-pound midfielder, who finished the 2014 Division I KingCo Conference lacrosse season as one of the top faceoff specialists in the state with a 60-percent win percentage while ranking third on the Newport squad with 65 ground balls, knows he has some work to do to earn playing time at the next level.

“I need to work on my consistency,” said Lau who can also score, posting 20 points (8g, 12a) in 20 games for the Knights last spring. “I’ll play my best game then lose my mojo,” he said. “I just need to take a deep breath and piece it all together.”

Where lacrosse is his passion, it’s football that has given the three-year Knights letterman the confidence to excel by example.

“We were up with just a few minutes left,” recalled Lau, who at cornerback twice stepped in front of Federal Way senior Charlie Taumoepeau, the Eagles most imposing wide receiver at 6-4, 245 pounds, finally pulling down an interception to seal the late November state football quarterfinal victory. All on his 18th birthday.

“The first one got called back on a hold,” said Lau who three plays later again beat Taumoepeau for the interception to end the game. “I went to the sidelines and the whole team mobbed me,” he said. “The whole thing felt like a dream.”

For Lau, the moment was realization that extraordinary effort can produce game-changing results – and bleed over to lacrosse.

“Trying to feed off of that this spring will be pretty cool,” said Lau, who made an official visit to the liberal arts campus of some 4,700 students in late September after being noticed by Mount Olive coaches this past July while playing for an east-coast Fellowship of Christian Athletes team at this summer’s Champ Camp recruiting event in Gettysburg, Pa.

“Justin’s really quick and has great agility and lateral motion,” said Newport lacrosse coach Ian Lee, a standout midfielder while playing for NCAA Division III Messiah College in Pennsylvania. “Whether it’s off the line in football or hands on a faceoff it translates to both sports.”

It’s that agility that provides Lau with a chance to make an impact right away at Mount Olive. But not without putting in the work, Lee said.

“They’ll be looking for him to get stronger. But with his quickness and faceoff work ethic he could see time at the (faceoff) ‘X’ right away,” Lee said. “He has a lot of heart.”

Washington state high school graduates having an impact for Mount Olive include seniors Jon Williams (Lynnwood, Wash. / Lynnwood High School, and Alex Tindall (Lynnwood, Wash. / Meadowdale High School), juniors Matt Shields (Mercer Island, Wash. / Mercer Island High School), Ryan Morris and Luke Morris (both of Snohomish, Wash. / Providence Classical Christian School), Nico Shewey (Redmond, Wash. / Redmond HS). The Trojans freshman class includes Tindall’s brother Jordan Tindall (Lynnwood, Wash. / Meadowdale High School), Davyd Powell (Snohomish, Wash. / Snohomish High School), Gabe Girgus (Snohomish, Wash. / Cedar Park Christian School) and Niko May (Edmonds, Wash. / Meadowdale High School).

Last spring, its second year of NCAA play, Mount Olive posted a pair of 20-goal games and went to the wire against national top five programs and conference members Limestone (national runner-up) and Pfeiffer. In 2013, Murphy’s Trojans ranked sixth in the nation in scoring offense with 13.50 goals per game in 2013.

Meanwhile, Lau is just taking it all in and looking forward to helping his Newport teammates better their 2014 record of 5-15-0 and perhaps earn a berth in the Washington Lacrosse Boys State Tournament this spring.

“That’s my drive,” he said. “I just need to push myself to where I want it that bad.”