Thursday, February 17, 2011

More Vintage Lacrosse







Several nights ago I was over at my Mom's house delivering some Beef Stew. Since my Father's passing, Mom lives alone and cooking for one can be a hassle. My Wife and I enjoy cooking and often make extra in order to do a little "Meals on Wheels" action for my Mom. She still lives in the house I grew up in about 3 1/2 miles from where I live now.
After stowing the stew in the Fridge, I hung around to chat and watch an old movie on AMC. During our conversation my Mom said she was going thru some boxes of photos and found some Lacrosse pictures from my High School career.
The pictures above are from a Tournament my High School played against 2 teams from Long Island: Northport and East Islip. The Long Island kids stayed at our teams homes and we played the Tournament at Penn's Franklin Field. This is circa 1980, my Junior Year. The bottom photo is me during warm-ups behind the bench.
The "turf" at Franklin Filed was like outdoor carpet stretched over concrete and it was hard as rock. The ball bounced like mad on this surface and if you took a spill you lost flesh and bruised bone. It was a cold day...but now a very warm memory of a great day of Lacrosse. We Harriton "Rams" beat the NY teams in both games and we were proud as Hell to prevail over teams from Long Island..well known as a hot bed of Lacrosse ( Along with Baltimore and the Main Line.)
In these photos I am wearing # 12...not my usual number in those days but it was so early in the Season we did not have our fresh Jerseys yet so we wore varsity jerseys as the year before. One of the photos show me laying out an attackman from our opponent and the others show some fairly good Man-Down and man to man coverage. Some of the other guys in the photos are still in the area and I see them once in a while...I cannot wait to show them these pictures.

8 comments:

Sandra said...

These are great photos. {fabulous colors} What a wonderful memory. And let me say that these kind gestures that you and your wife do for your mother mean more to her than you can ever imagine. Have a great evening. xoxo

Yankee-Whisky-Papa said...

I remember that mood perfectly... spring season always started cold, and a cold lax ball was deadly. Cold also meant that defensemen broke their Brine and STX heads on poke-checks to the ribs of attackmen and elbows of middies like me. Early spring season was rough conditioning for those who hadn't played a winter sport (I was required to play one each season in exchange for limited access to the family station wagon), and a two mile warm-up (in full gear) preceded each practice, which ended in a series of brutal meritocratic sprinting exercises. I couldn't help but notice the second photo from the bottom... the attackman is positively naked at two yards from the forward crease, and advantaged by his left hand against at right-handed stanced goalie.

Fantastic photos!

ADG said...

Great story. I'm mostly taken by your mom still living in the house you grew up in. Ditto for my mom. Extry nice that you live so close.

LPC said...

What a nice son. It's not just the food you're giving her.

Main Line Sportsman said...

LPC-True..the food deliveries give me a chance to sit and talk for a while...which we both enjoy.
ADG-It is nice to live close by...for many reasons.

Summer is a Verb said...

My niece's bf scored 2 of the 7winning goals over Duke on that very same field this past Saturday. Kind of a full circle post reading moment pour moi..XXOO

hawkeye315 said...

Long Island kid here...nice post.

Jennine Stalder said...

What a great memory from your high school days! I think being in a team is one of the greatest experiences and achievement we had back then. Anyway, you look great in your uniform. Did you keep them for souvenirs.

Jennine Stalder @ UESports.com