This article appears in the Northeast version of the July/August edition of US Lacrosse Magazine. Don’t get the mag? Join US Lacrosse today to start your subscription.

Kate Laico celebrated her 15th birthday in January by going to the US Lacrosse Convention and earning her Level 1 coaching certificate in the Coach Development Program.

“Everybody else was an adult,” Laico said. “I was actually surprised. I thought there would be more people doing it like me.”

Laico will use her coaching certification next spring as part of her Girl Scout Gold Award project that centers on restarting lacrosse clinics for kindergarten to second-grade girls in her hometown of East Meadow, N.Y. 

“Since I heard that our town stopped with the lacrosse girls starting at a young age, I wanted to bring it back,” said Laico, who will be a sophomore goalie at East Meadow High School next year. “Since I was working on my Gold Award, I thought it was a good chance to jump right in on it.”

As a young child, Laico began going to East Meadow Girls PAL Lacrosse clinics in kindergarten at the urging of her father, Jon, who played high school lacrosse. The same year, she started in Girl Scouts. Ten years later, she has combined the two pursuits to restart the developmental program.

“I learned that even though lacrosse has such a big community on Long Island, there’s so much room for us to grow the sport,” Laico said. “There’s still opportunities to grow the sport and get it out there more. We can get more players.”

Laico wants to give others a better start in the game. In volunteering with third- and fourth-graders last spring, she saw players thrust into games without enough preparation. “I felt like it was harder for them than it was for me because they didn’t have the fundamentals,” she said.

Laico anticipates holding her first clinic next spring, and is working on the details that will allow it to continue for years to come. Sessions are expected to be twice per week over one month.

“Even after my project is done, it’s about making it sustainable and keeping it going,” Laico said. “I’ll stay with the project and do as much for the league as I can until I can’t anymore. More people will carry it on after I’m done.”

Laico shared her ideas at the Long Island Metro Lacrosse Foundation town hall meeting in October 2017. Andi O’Connor, the Northeast and Eastern Mid-Atlantic regional director for US Lacrosse, suggested that Laico get her coaching certification at LaxCon.

“I learned what it’s like from a coach’s perspective and what I needed to know to help the younger girls more effectively,” Laico said. “It was about not being afraid to express myself, and how to be a leader on a team.”

Laico met with East Meadow Girls PAL Lacrosse, and she’s had help with her proposal from the likes of Mike Nelson, the president of Nassau County PAL Lacrosse and a LI Metro board member, who has offered to supply used equipment to the clinics. 

“Everyone is very supportive,” Laico said. “They all want to help as much as they can. They want to make a bigger network of lacrosse on Long Island for younger girls.”

Laico hopes to attract at least 20 girls per grade to the first year of clinics. She will look to the LI Metro chapter and volunteer coaches as well as teammates from East Meadow and her Team 91 Long Island club team for help in coaching at the clinics. 

“I have three friends who want to go to LaxCon with me next year,” Laico said. “My birthday is the week before. We want to go back.”

Locally Grown

Delaware

The Delaware Lacrosse Foundation hosted its annual All-Lacrosse Banquet and Senior All-Star games June 11-12 in Dover. University of Delaware men’s lacrosse coach Ben DeLuca was the keynote speaker. ... The DLF hosted a youth girls’ lacrosse playday prior to the University of Delaware women’s game April 22 against William and Mary. Players from Atlantic Youth Lacrosse and Avon Grove got to greet the college players with high-fives in the pre-game tunnel and post-game autograph session.  ... Wilmington Rec & Parks is hosting a summer league for the local community centers.

Delmarva

The Wicomoco County (Md.) school system will introduce lacrosse in PE classes in 2018-2019 through a US Lacrosse grant.

New Jersey North

The NJJLL put more than 200 coaches through US Lacrosse Coach Development Program Level 1 training after initiating a policy to have at least one US Lacrosse-certified coach per team. The JGLA, meanwhile, continued its policy of offering Level 1 training to coaches, while also implementing a sideline manager program.

New Jersey South

Many programs in the Central, South Jersey, Coastal and New Jersey Shore Youth Lacrosse Leagues are engaging new participants grades K-1 with coed intro clinics utilizing US Lacrosse programs and the Lacrosse Athlete Development Model.

Philadelphia 

Keystone College hosted a Northeast Pennsylvania Day of Lacrosse televised on the local Fox TV station April 25. ... Mary Fran Riffle went from leading the Philadelphia Girls Lacrosse Association to starting a new youth program in Garnet Valley. In one year, she has introduce more than 100 girls to the sport.

Long Island Metro

The Nassau County PAL put more than 1,000 coaches through US Lacrosse CDP Level 1 live clinics in preparation for the spring season. Wrote one coach: “I have been around the game for 30 years and walked away with plenty of new information that I will implement at both the high school and youth levels, very valuable for anybody.” Another coach said he would take what he learned at the clinic and use it to introduce the game to 100-plus kids grades K-1.

Picture This
Mixed Company

The Princeton Lacrosse Club held a play day with Trenton and Harlem Lacrosse in April in which they combined and mixed players from all of the teams. Afterward, Cameron Carothers, VP and director of operations of PLC, addressed the eighth-grade boys.

My USL Rep
Andi O'Connor, Eastern Mid-Atlantic

O’Connor joined US Lacrosse in December 2012 and oversees development efforts in the Eastern Mid-Atlantic Region, including parts of Pennsylvania, Maryland, New York, the states of Delaware and New Jersey. A former Maryland and U.S. national team player and local lacrosse administrator/coach, O’Connor latched onto US Lacrosse as a Greater Baltimore Chapter Board member in the late 1990s and early 2000s and reconnected through the Coach Development Program as a trainer in 2009.

How can US Lacrosse help grow the sport in your backyard? Contact Andi at aoconnor@uslacrosse.org or 410-235-6882, extension 171.