Cultivating the Creator's Game

Very good article about growing the game of lacrosse in Montana.

Cultivating the Creator's Game 

 Montana's fastest growing sport is the oldest in North America 

  by EDNOR THERRIAULT

Rain was spitting and a cold wind had the few dozen sideline spectators pulling their winter coats tightly around themselves as they watched the Hellgate Knights lacrosse team play its home opener against the Big Sky Eagles. Lacking access to high school facilities, the teams played at DeSmet School, west of the airport. The tiny schoolyard was barely big enough to accommodate a regulation lacrosse field and one sideline was just six inches from the asphalt basketball court.

The whistle blew. A Hellgate midfielder won the face-off and quickly ran the ball upfield. He passed to a waiting attacker, who was immediately confronted by an Eagle defender. Panicked, the attacker fired the ball toward the far sideline, hoping a teammate was there.

Five yards off the corner of the goal, Hellgate's Spencer Schultz leaped high into the air to spear the ball with his stick and save it from sailing out of bounds. As he came down, he rotated toward the goal and curled his stick down low, sneaking a shot an inch or two beneath the goalie's stick and into the goal. Schultz pulled off the move in one seamless motion that left jaws gaping both on the field and along the sidelines.

After a moment of stunned silence, the crowd went nuts. If only more people had been there to see it. 

Lacrosse is still an anomaly in western Montana, an exotic "prep school sport" they play Back East. The West is catching up, though, with high school and college programs thriving in Washington, Oregon and Colorado. Even the University of Montana has a club team with a national championship under its belt. But it's taken more than 400 years for the oldest game in North America to make steady inroads throughout the Treasure State.                                                                  

Lacrosse's origins are hard to pin down. European explorers and missionaries first witnessed American Indians playing in the 1630s, but different precursors of the game, such as shinny and double ball, were part of Native culture for centuries. The age of lacrosse is usually placed between 400 and 1,000 years, but many tribes familiar with the sport believe it has been around longer than they have, a game that was played by the animals before man even existed. 

The Native version of the game was a deeply spiritual undertaking; it is still referred to by tribal members as "The Creator's Game." American Indian lore tells of games sometimes lasting for days. The playing field frequently stretched for miles, involving as many as one thousand players on each side. Games were played to entertain the Creator, but also to heal the sick, train and strengthen warriors and as an alternative to war itself.  PLEASE GO HERE TO READ FULL ARTICLE

The Grow Lacrosse Experiment in...Montana?!?

Big Sky, Big State

Lacrosse is growing tremendously all over the country and Montana is no different.  However, Montana is a HUGE state with towns spread far and wide and no large metropolitan areas (think Twin Cities).  This fact complicates things for the growth of the game there.  So, what does this have to do with Minnesota?  Actually, a lot!

In Montana, a tireless promoter of the sport is embarking on an experiment to Grow the Game there and bring it to as many towns as possible by 2015.  Please go read his plan at Montana.laxallstars.com and then come back to this article.   Kevin Flynn's idea is bold, grand, tireless and audacious, and that's why I like it so much!

The reality is, outside of the Twin Cities metro area, where 85% of our state's lacrosse teams are, Minnesota is much like Montana.  There are only 13 teams (which includes 3 from Rochester and two from St. Cloud) outside the Metro area of the Twin Cities, and very few of these teams are located in smaller towns.

Lacrosse in the tiny town of Pablo, Montana

Of states with the most growth in lacrosse West of the Mississippi River, Minnesota is the most "Metro-Centric" of them all.  Look at Colorado with their Mountain Conference and teams in small towns like Aspen, Frisco, Steamboat Springs, Durango, Glenwood Springs, and Eagle to name a few.  Or Oregon, with teams ALL over the state - and they're all club programs!  With teams in smaller towns outside metro areas and spread from one corner to the other in small towns like Sisters and Redmond and from Hood River to Salem to Bend to Eugene to Roseburg, Oregon really is a model for spreading the game throughout an entire state to small towns and large.  Washington and Utah are also good examples of states with lacrosse programs spread out across the state in small towns and large.  Even Idaho with only 19 teams in the state manages to spread their teams out to smaller communities from north to south like Cour d' Alene, Sandpoint, Moscow and Wood River.

Could Minnesota do better?  Yes, I think we could do a better job spreading the game to smaller towns and cities in out-state areas in the North and South.  How could we do that?  Let's take a closer look at Kevin Flynn's plan for Montana tomorrow and how that might be done in Minnesota.