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Scrimmages were a significant part of the lacrosse camp at the University
A group of boys, 12 years old and younger, participate in a scrimmage during UMW's lacrosse camp on Tuesday. |
By KURT NICOLL
There might be hotter beds of lacrosse talent, but Brendan Bailey jumped at the opportunity to attend the five-day instructional camp held this week at the University of Mary Washington.
"I like the school; the campus and area are really nice. And being close to D.C. and Baltimore was important to me," the 17-year-old defensive specialist from Durham, N.C., said before a recent afternoon session. "[Coming now] gave me a true feeling of what it is going to be like."
Bailey's Cardinal Gibbons team in Raleigh won a state title in the spring and UMW is near the top of his list of potential colleges. The past two summers he has attended camps at Duke and Washington and Lee.
Bailey's family has a rich lacrosse tradition. His father played for Loyola of Baltimore and his mother for Frostburg State; a great-grandfather played in goal for Johns Hopkins.
Bailey may be one of the most talented of the roughly 160 campers attending, but he did not come the farthest. That distinction goes to a teenager from Rhode Island.
Campers range in age from 8 to 17 and are divided into three age groups for instruction and scrimmaging.
Besides the day campers from the Fredericksburg area, many participants come from Prince William County or Northern Virginia and stay overnight in one of the college's air-conditioned dorms. Besides frequent water breaks during the three-a-day workouts, campers also had several chances to cool off at the Goolrick Hall swimming pool.
West Springfield High School coach Chris Brengel has been a member of the camp's staff for six years and expresses a sense of pride in its growth.
"This camp has gotten better every year. Kurt [Glaeser] has done an outstanding job of bringing in more and more kids each year," said Brengel, who once served as Glaeser's assistant coach at UMW.
"I tell parents to give them at least 3-6 months to play the sport and they will either love it or not like it--there is no in-between," he added. "If a kid loves it, his job is to recruit two or three younger kids into the sport."
First-time campers Hunter Bell and Josh Larson seem to be picking up the sport quickly, perhaps due to their participation with the Fredericksburg Falcons hockey team.
Asked the toughest thing he's had to do at camp, Bell dead-panned: "Walking from the college to the field."
With a coaching staff of 17 as well as the presence of an athletic trainer, the camp offers youngsters an abundance of personal instruction and advice.
"We try to do as much instruction as we can. That's the key to this camp," said UMW graduate David Morris, working his third summer camp at the college. "The most difficult thing to learn, especially for the younger kids, is being able to play with both hands, switching hands to right and left makes you a more versatile lacrosse player.
"But it is so hard for them to get away from what they are good at when they are naturally right- or left-handed. It's hard for them to play with the other hand."
Drop-outs are few, according to Glaeser, and usually consist of youngsters trying the sport out for the first time or ones who find the practice schedule too demanding.
The camp de-emphasizes the physical contact of the sport, particularly with the youngest age group, so serious injuries have been infrequent. Two summers ago, one camper suffered a broken thumb.
This is the fourth year that the camp has been co-sponsored by US Sports Camps (a subsidiary of Nike) and Glaeser voiced a satisfaction with how the camp continue to grow while keeping its developmental focus intact.
"This camp is about 'how to'--how to throw, how to catch, how to pick up a ball off the ground, how to shoot, how to hold your stick, how to move your feet--real fundamental stuff for a new player," he said.
"But the other thing we emphasize is that it just starts here. We teach you what to do. Beyond this, you have to go and work on it."
Despite his lacrosse heritage, Bailey said this week's camp has proven particularly beneficial due to the defensive tips he has received from staff counselor B.J. Jenkins of Shenandoah University regarding footwork and positioning.
Entering his ninth season as Shenandoah's head coach, Jenkins indicated he is more concerned about the overall growth of the sport itself, rather than a chance to evaluate talent that might someday play for his team in Winchester.
"I've seen the skill level at this camp go from 'not really recruitable kids' at the upper level to quite a few," he said. "And it gives the first-time camper the opportunity to make a decision on if this is the sport for them or not.
"If they learn this isn't the sport for them, for a week they've had good activity and camaraderie with their fellow players. And they can move on to another sport."
To reach KURT NICOLL:
Email: knicoll@freelancestar.com
