October 12, 2009
Second Catamount Classic doubly good
BRAINTREE, Mass. — At 3:30 p.m. on a glorious fall Sunday, most of the crowd had filed out to the parking lot at Thayer Academy’s off-campus athletic fields. The last games of the second annual Catamount Classic were being played on adjacent fields amid the red, yellow, and green foliage glowing in the afternoon sun. There was nothing on the line in these games, no state championship or school records. But you wouldn't know it from the sounds and the effort on the field Oct. 11.
University of Vermont and Bentley players were hacking away at each other trying to dislodge the ball, shouldering each other for position as their teammates shouted and screamed encouragement from the sidelines. On the other field, similar scenes involving players from Siena and Robert Morris took place. There were no speakers blasting updates, and no scoreboards, but the 80 or so people gathered on the artificial grass by the field or the natural grass on the nearby hill didn't seem to care.
Eleven teams (Adelphi, Albany, Bentley, Colgate, Holy Cross, Le Moyne, Massachusetts, Robert Morris, Siena, Western New England, and Vermont) traveled to Braintree to take part in the second annual Catamount Classic – Lacrosse For a Cure, a fund-raiser for the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston.
Keeping score isn't what the event is about. And if any of the coaches were keeping track of stats, they didn’t divulge the information after the games.

 Vermont coach Ryan Curtis couldn’t even provide a final score for his team’s match against Bentley moments after it was over.


“I would guess that we won,” he said, “but as far as a score, I don’t know.”


“We don’t keep track,” Curtis added. “We don’t want guys worrying about that stuff. At the end of the day, results in the fall mean nothing. It’s a chance to see where you are with new guys and just a chance to play and have some film to watch over the winter as you go into the season.”

The tournament’s major purpose is to raise money for testicular cancer research at Dana-Farber and awareness about the disease among the players, who are in a high-risk age group.
“The hope,’’ said Curtis, “is that that’s really what we’d get out of this ... more people aware of this, and to know what to look for, and that it is treatable if you approach it the way.”
Ryan’s wife, Kelly, who organized the event, said her biggest worry at the beginning of the day was whether there would be ample parking.


“We were kind of overwhelmed with how many people we had here,” she said on the day of the event. “We think we had over 3,000 people and there were a lot of kids this year, which is fantastic.”
According to Kelly Curtis’ estimate, the Classic more than tripled its attendance from the first edition last year. A couple days after the event, Kelly Curtis estimated nearly $40,000 was raised for Dana-Farber, roughly twice the amount raised at last year’s event, and donations were still arriving at press time. Admission for this year’s event was $10.
Vermont freshman Michael Connors, a touted long stick midfielder who helped lead Walpole (Mass.) High to a state title last season, showed he is driving force off the field as well, turning in more than 37 donations. In addition, the Catamounts will donate signed event T-shirts and eight Maverik lacrosse sticks to pediatric patients at the Vermont Cancer Center.
The event – which included 17 games and culminated with a tailgate party featuring musician Wise K. Rokobili – ran smoothly. (Rokobili has appeared at many events to raise awareness for testicular cancer.)


Seventy-eight volunteers helped ensure the event was a success. Last year, according to Kelly Curtis, just 20 volunteers were available to meet the needs of 1,000 attendees.


“I’m very happy with this year’s event,” she said. “Very happy. We’ve had a larger crowd, we had our act together this year. We had lots of people come out and help and volunteer.”
The coaches were impressed as well. Western New England College’s John Klepacki got a chance to scout his team and even picked up a quick scrimmage with Siena, coached by his old Springfield College classmate Brian Brecht.


“This is awesome,” said Klepacki. “To be a part of this is just an honor for Western New England College. Our players, on their own, raised an extra $500 for the cause. I think it was a great way for us to end our fall season and be at such a great event with such talented teams, and there’s a purpose to it. I think it’s something that we definitely think is good for New England.”
Of course in addition to raising money for a worthy cause, teams know they need to prepare for the upcoming season, and the Classic is becoming a major date on the fall ball calendar. Despite the intensity on the field, there were a lot of missed passes and clumsy shots as freshmen played at college speed for the first time and new teammates tried to jell. According to Brecht, even his team’s extra 20-minute scrimmage, which was all the time NCAA rules permitted WNEC and Siena to compete, was valuable.
“We have such a big squad and a lot of new guys,” said Brecht. “We had 16 seniors who graduated and 20 new freshmen. I thought it was a great opportunity for us to get another 20 minutes of lacrosse in and kind of evaluate. We want to see where our starters and our returning guys are, where we mix and match a little bit. We also want to give all the younger guys and everyone a chance to play and get some minutes and evaluate and see where we are.”
Curtis said a pair of midfielder, sophomore Pete Oswald (Cohasset, Mass./Thayer Academy) and freshman Mike Clarke (Dedham, Mass./Lawrenceville School), stood out and added that his team fared well on faceoffs.
“We wanted to see what they could do against other guys,” he said, “and I thought they did well.”
Vermont midfielder Matthew Parker Bunnell, who helped organize the event, said the fact that a lot of younger players are trying to make the team ensure a high level of commitment from all the UVM players.
“We’re all out there trying our best, trying to make that spot, trying to get on that line,” he said. “That’s what the coaches asked for, was some intensity today.”
Klepacki was also happy with his team’s performances faceoffs and with the play of some of his young defensemen, and got a chance to gauge whether his team will be able to play the same style it has been playing the past couple of years.
“I think our transition game was exciting,” he said. “I thought we might have lost a little of that.”
