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The clinic, held on December 4th at Seattle Pacific University was
put on by the local US Lacrosse Washington State Chapter.
Lakeside Coach Tony Olney headed up the meetings which brought in
two prominent coaches from the East Coast to Seattle.
Mike Murphy, who is the head coach at Haverford College in
Pennsylvania, led off the discussions explaining what it takes to
develop and build a successful program. This was a well received
talk because most of the schools which were represented in the
clinic are either a first year program or have just begun in the
past few years. A lot of coaches who were at the clinic are starting
new middle school and youth teams. Mike discussed the vision needed
as a new coach, the pre-season preparation that is necessary, and
how to be a complete coach for your players. Mike Murphy is in his
third season at Haverford which competes in division three. In his
first year at Haverford Mike tripled the win total from the year
before and this past season the black squirrels notched their first
victory over a top ten ranked team. In the afternoon Mike talked
about team offense and how to create quality scoring opportunities.
The other guest speaker at the clinic was the lacrosse well-known
Tom Ryan. Tom Ryan was a college All-American and later went on too
play at the professional level in both the NLL and MLL before
coaching at both Loyola and Towson. Tom spoke on the how to develop
a coaching philosophy for new coaches and in his afternoon session
talked about what it takes to develop an offensive player. In
developing an offensive player Tom stressed on how too improve the
player�s skill development through dodging, passing, and shooting
drills. Tom Ryan coaches the Men�s Elite Crease Monkey travel team
which recently won the Men�s Annual Hawaii Invitational Tournament
held in Honolulu.
The Clinic ended up with both coaches giving demonstrations on
face-offs and drills to improve players. The US Lacrosse Washington
Chapter will hold a first aid clinic for coaches in the upcoming
month, stay tuned too WALAX for details.
Erik Hewitt, Staff Reporter |
