Growth of lacrosse in RI glowing tribute to late Bishop Hendricken coach
Bill Reynolds
Providence Journal
Monday, May 24, 2004
WARWICK — Earlier in the week, the forecast for Sunday had called for cloudy skies, maybe even rain.
“Don’t worry,” said Sue Shemenski to people organizing the event. “You do everything else, and Scott will take care of the weather.”
She was referring to the Scott Shemenski Memorial, named for her husband. The second annual game took place at Bishop Hendricken High School yesterday on a day that belonged on a postcard. It was in honor of the former Hendricken lacrosse coach and co-founder of the R.I. Youth Lacrosse League who died of leukemia three years ago at 43.
He was one of those unsung heroes in sports, the kind of guy who does all the things nobody wants to do, the kind of guy who makes the calls and lines the field and does all the behind-the scenes things. The kind of guy who spread the gospel of lacrosse to anyone who would listen. The kind of guy who makes sports work. The kind of man who should be remembered, for we can never have enough of them.
But yesterday’s game was more than that.
It was also a game to honor this sport that’s mushrooming in popularity, this sport that’s seemingly come out of nowhere in Rhode Island in the past few years.
You don’t believe it?
Consider the numbers:
There are now nearly 800 children in the R.I. Youth Lacrosse League, where just a few years ago there were about 20.
There are now youth teams around the state, where once there was just one in the West Bay.
There are now four under-11 teams in South County alone, where just a few years ago there were none.
There are now 10 boys’ and 9 girls’ teams in the R.I. Interscholastic League, with several more having club teams, just waiting to get into the league. Five years ago, there were none.
But those are just numbers, as cold as an accountant’s ledger sheet. Yesterday was the human face, all the kids in their uniforms, carrying their lacrosse sticks. All the kids in the next wave of lacrosse in Rhode Island. All the kids who now benefit from the people who came before them, the pioneers who changed the landscape.
“It’s just going to keep getting bigger,” said Kevin Murray. “There’s no question about it.”
Murray, who coaches Hendricken, is a good barometer. He is 40 now, but didn’t play lacrosse until he got to La Salle, for the simple reason there was no youth lacrosse then. Not here anyway. He played college lacrosse at C.W. Post on Long Island, came home to coach in Rhode Island back when the sport was strictly a cult.
Lacrosse was seen as a prep-school sport then, about as foreign to most Rhode Island kids as curling. Take away Long Island and suburban Maryland and few high schools in the country played lacrosse. That’s changing, and you don’t need a proclamation to get the message. The kids with their lacrosse sticks tell you that.
Take Murray’s son, Sean, 13. There’s no question he’s growing up in a different reality than his father did. To him, the game is an antidote to baseball, which he sees as boring, “like standing around and watching the grass grow.” To him, lacrosse is fast-paced and physical.
Which is what Steve O’Donnell first liked about it.
Now a major in the state police, O’Donnell first played lacrosse at La Salle in the late ’70s, then in college at the University of New Haven. He later coached at Providence College for a while, but when he moved to Smithfield and began a family, he found himself in a place where lacrosse was just another word in the dictionary that no one knew.
Lacrosse?
What was lacrosse?
So he started the Northern Rhode Island Lacrosse League.
“We started with five kids,” he said. “Three of mine, and two of my neighbors. And no help whatsoever from the town.”
Now he has 300 boys and girls, and the town gives them a field to play on.
He also helps coach a 13-year-old all-star team that’s scheduled to play in tournaments around the Northeast, and he believes lacrosse is going to be the next soccer, that it’s just a matter of time.
That was Shemenski’s vision, one that was articulated yesterday by Josh Blumenthal, who coached at Hendricken with him, and spearheaded yesterday’s memorial game.
“A year ago, I was going to contribute $50 to youth lacrosse in Scott’s memory, and then I said, ‘no,’ I want to do something more substantial,” he said.
Last year, there was one game that raised roughly $3,500. Yesterday, there were three games and the goal was to raise $10,000, money dispersed by the Scott A. Shemenski Foundation that helps finance youth lacrosse around the state.
“Scott is such an inspiration for so many of us, and this keeps his memory alive,” Blumenthal said.
Yes, it does.
For this is Shemenski’s legacy, all these kids in their uniforms and their lacrosse sticks. All these kids who play in all the youth leagues around the state. All the kids who are growing up in a different environment than Murray and O’Donnell did a generation ago. All the kids who owe a debt to Scott Shemenski, even if they don’t know it.