Houston Lacrosse Project

Kiernan Limming was nice enough to come by the house and sit outside with me to put a bow on the Houston Lacrosse Project Podcast. This is the final episode... it was a blast to sit down with Kiernan to talk about this podcast and what I have learned from all of the people I have talked to. I am grateful to everyone who was generous enough to spend their time with me during this effort. I am equally grateful for all of the people who listened to the podcast, got something out of it, and were kind enough to reach out to me and tell me so. I had a blast. Thanks.

This is a special Latvian, quarantine edition of the podcast. You end up with a solid three hours of lacrosse discussion when you combine a really interesting local lacrosse coach with a great history of the game and the ongoing quarantine-ish state we are currently in here in the Houston area. If you are interested in Houston Lacrosse and some Long Island Lacrosse history invest the time in this episode. Andris grew up on Long Island. He was introduced to the game in 7th grade by his cousin. Andris played all four years for his high school, then went on to play his freshman year at the University of Vermont. Following an injury he transferred to Hofstra. He finished up his college career at Hofstra. Andris had his first taste of coaching as a Graduate Assistant when he returned to the University of Vermont for graduate school. In 2006 Andris played in the World Games in Canada for the Latvian national team. After a year coaching at the middle school in hi home town he and his wife moved to Houston. After he landed in Houston he got plugged in to the local mens’ lacrosse scene and quickly landed coaching roles at Presbyterian School and the University of Houston. In 2014 Andris and his wife moved up to the Woodlands and he took on his current role as the Varsity Head Coach for the Woodlands D2 team.

Jess grew up in New York. She first got her hands on a lacrosse stick her freshman year at Tappan Zee High School. She played all four years of high school. After graduating she attended the University of New Hampshire where she studied History and played lacrosse her entire college career. After graduation she stayed local and played competitive women's lacrosse for Gotham lacrosse for five years. In 2013 she moved to Texas looking for a change of scenery. Once she landed in Texas she started her coaching career. She has coached girls' lacrosse at all ages since she has been in Texas. She has spent season with Vandergrift, Westlake and Lake Travis. Jess is currently the Varsity Defensive Coordinator for Lake Travis Girls' Lacrosse. Jess is also involved in youth lacrosee in Austin and THSLL. We decided to focus specifcially on girls' lacrosse during this discussion.

Amanda started playing lacrosse as a freshman in High School in New York. She scored the first four goals her high school team ever scored. After her high school career she attended Ithica College where she rowed and played lacrosse her freshman year. Following her freshman year she played club lacrosse at Ithica College. Towards the end of her college career she began coaching middle school girls lacrosse. Following her college career she moved to Connecticut where she coached for six years. Amanda moved to Houston in 2015 and pretty quickly got engaged with the local lacrosse community. She began coaching at St. John's High School in 2016. After a few years as the Head Coach of the JV1 team at St. John's High School this is her first season as the Varsity Head Coach. It is exciting to finally get some representation from the girls game. Amanda is a great representative!

Despite the fact Travis spent some of his early childhood here in the Houston area, he is new to the Houston Lacrosse scene. Travis first picked up a stick in 5th grade while he lived in Baltimore. He played his high school lacrosse career in Virginia and headed off to the Air Force Academy after graduation. Travis played four years for the Air Force Academy lacrosse team. After graduating from the Air Force Academy he had full career serving our country in the Air Force He and his family have settled back in the Houston area. He recently accepted a faculty position and the head coaching role of the boys lacrosse team at Houston Christian High School. It is great to have a new face on the Houston lacrosse scene. I am excited Travis took the time to speak with me.

At this point I feel like I am in the very beginning stages of an extended anthropological study at St. John's High School. Ronnie began playing lacrosse when he was a sophomore in high school in Westchester NY. Ronnie did not plan on playing lacrosse after his high school career ended. However, when he was a junior at Ithaca College we walked on to the lacrosse team and earned a spot for the next three years. Ronnie picked up the coaching bug when he returned to his hometown after college and began to serve his old community. Ronnie landed in Houston four years ago. He very quickly got hooked up with David Cohn and helped round out the staff at St. John's along with Kyle Dowd. I don't know how you can listen to these St. John's coaches and not get fired up.

Mike is starting his third season with Pearland. This will be his second year at the Head Coach. Mike began playing lacrosse in 7th grade at Holy Trinity Middle School in North Carolina. Mike played his high school career in North Carolina as well. After graduating high school he played two years at Pfeiffer University in North Carolina. After several years of coaching at Hopewell High School he moved to the Houston area in 2012 where he kicked off his local coaching career at Friendswood High School. He has been a big proponent of building lacrosse through playing packed regular season schedules against quality teams. His Pearland schedule last season reflects this and the results speak to the success it generates.

This episode is tremendous. It is worth the investment of your time! Bill grew up in in New Jersey where we started playing lacrosse in high school. He started to catch the coaching bug while he was in college when he coached the middle school team at Princecton Day School. Bill also coached his little brothers high school team. Following his move to Texas after the economic crash in 2008 he started coach again with the Lake Travis youth organization, subsequently the Cedar Ridge High School Team and now Dripping Springs. Bill has done an unbelievable job building the culture at Drip. This discussion drills into a considerable amount of detail around how he has gone about building and tweaking the culture at Drip with undeniable results.

If you really know the local Houston lacrosse scene, you know the name Dave Lintner. Dave grew up in Syracuse New York and attended West Genesee High School. After graduating from West Genesee he attended Cornell with the intention of playing on the Cornell soccer team... he ended up playing for the Cornell lacrosse team instead. Dave moved to Houston in the early 90s and started playing in the local men's club lacrosse circuit. I first bumped into Dave with the Houston Hurricanes club team and the 7sfor7 lacrosse tournament held each year in memory of Drew Webb to bring attention to mental health issues with our youth. There is some really thoughtful discussion regarding the state of the sport in Houston in this episode. I had a great time sitting down with Dave at his office and speaking with him.

This discussion could have gone on for hours... and it still might at some point in the near future. Jordan came to the sport of lacrosse relatively late in his sophomore year of high school in Connecticut. Jordan played his college lacrosse in New England. When he was a sophomore in college in Massachusetts he began his coaching career at a local high school. Due to an injury earlier in his career he used his final year of his athletic eligibility during the first year of graduate school and moved into his first college coaching experience in the second year of graduate school. He has coached at Bellarmine University and Bowdoin. His “crash course” in coaching at the college level prepared him nicely for the challenges of lacrosse in the Lone Star state. After coaching at Bowie and Westlake high schools here in Texas he is now the Head Coach and Youth Director for Austin High School and Austin Youth Lacrosse. The crazy thing about this discussion is we barley touched on his role at Austin High School. This is a great discussion about his lacrosse history, his coaching philosophy and the work he and others are doing at Austin Youth Lacrosse.

David Higbee is the Executive Director of Bridge Lacrosse in Dallas. The mission of Bridge Lacrosse is "to use lacrosse to broaden the horizons of our community's youth". David has been with Bridge Lacrosse for 11 years. He has some great perspective on the history of the Bridge organization, as well as the role it will play in the future of lacrosse in the Dallas area. There is a lot of great information in this episode that we can all take away and apply to the development of our teams and programs in the greater Houston area.

I believe Carson is one of the most under-rated and under-recognized players to come out the Houston area. Carson started playing lacrosse in third grade with the Cy-Fair Iron Lions. He was one of the first players to play with the Houston Outlaws. Carson was also one of the early players to participate in the initial Stickstar combines in Houston. He played in the off-season with HOULA and Hurricanes when he was younger. He played with Stickstar and 3rd Coast once he got into 8th grade and high school. He graduated from Houston Christian High School in 2016 and he is currently in his senior year at Florida Southern where he has played all four years. This is a great discussion that includes the impact of off-season teams, overcoming injuries and the hard work required to excel at the college level.

Mike Brand grew up near Buffalo New York. Mike played the game growing up, but was not introduced to organized lacrosse until he was a freshman in high school. Following his high school and college playing career he was drawn into the coaching ranks. He spent some time playing the game and preaching the lacrosse gospel in England. After returning from England he began his college coaching career. His coaching experiences have taken him all over. Those of us in Texas are most familiar with his coaching career at Texas State, Reagan High School, Alamo Heights High School and the Tacos. This is a great discussion about his coaching career in general, his work at Texas State and the growth of the game in San Antonio.

This is the second player discussion I have had the luck of doing. This time around I was able to get three -for-one. I was fortunate enough to get three members of the 2019 graduating class from Langham Creek to drop by the house to discuss their experiences in Houston high school lacrosse, off-season lacrosse, recruiting and their first semester off at college. This discussion is so great because I was able to get three recent graduates who are friends to sit down and candidly talk about their lacrosse experiences. It was so much fun to sit and question them... and it was just as fun to see and listen to the three of them talk through their history with the game together. Just for the record... they were all in on the Polka music and my wife made them leave some leftover Halloween candy...

Chris is kind of a big thing... at least in Europe. Chris is one of my favorite lacrosse people. He is always a blast to sit down and talk with. Chris did not come to lacrosse until later in life around the time he was 30. He started playing and coaching in Florida. After 4 years coaching at Jesuit High School in Tampa Florida he made his way to Ireland where he coached and played. He spent time coaching both the Irish and the Austrian National Teams. Chris was also involved with the European Lacrosse Federation in a number of roles including developing coaching training for teams across Europe. After his coaching career in Europe Chris returned to the United States to take on the Head Coach position at Kingwood High School. There is some great history of the Kingwood program and some interesting discussion about high school lacrosse in Florida that provides a thoughtful contrast to the Texas experience.

The corporate logistics team worked double-overtime on this episode. We were lucky enough to track down Brendan Hunt in the wilds of Michigan for this discussion. Brendan came to the game as freshman in high school in Michigan. Following his high school career in Michigan he attended Michigan State University to pursue an education in... education. While he was at Michigan State University he played four seasons for the Michigan State University MCLA team. After college he landed in the greater Houston area for seven-ish years where he coached at the middle school level for three years and at Langham Creek High School for four years. Brendan recently left Texas and returned home to Michigan. This conversation is everything I thought it would be. A frank discussion about the sport of lacrosse in Houston from someone who experienced it first hand, but is now no longer directly involved in the local lacrosse scene.

Nick grew up in Houston and attended Bellaire High School. Nick played lacrosse at Bellaire until he graduated in 1990. He has the distinct honor of having both played and coached against Lamar High School and Coach Dave Vollmer. He played college lacrosse her at home as well at the University of Houston. Nick Started the team at Pershing Middle school... The Fighting Pandas! After his time with Pershing he was lured back to alma mater Bellaire to help coach and rebuild the team there. This season is Nick's third season leading Bellaire. He is doing a lot in the local lacrosse community to promote the team with young players and support growing programs in the city. In the summers he coaches the Houston Cougars. There is some terrific information regarding his relationship with Bellaire High School, outreach in the local inner loop community and the Bellaire social media presence.

Eric did not begin playing Lacrosse until he was introduced to it in the 8th Grade in Friendswood. At Friendswood High School he excelled in football and lacrosse. He had an outstanding career playing close defense for Steve Kirk and subsequently Mike Staub in Friendswood. Once he graduated high school he continued his academic and lacrosse career at Elmhurst. At Elmhurst he continued to excel on the field and in the classroom. Eric recently graduated and he is back in the Houston area kicking off his career and beginning to coach. This season he will be coaching defense at Pearland with Coach Mike Staub. This is the first interview I have done with a local player. There is some terrific perspective from a local Houston-area player who went on to be successful at the next level.

Rich grew up on Long Island and started playing lacrosse when he was in 7th grade. He played his high school lacrosse at St. Mary's and later attended Hobart where he played for three years... you heard me right, three years, and that is just one of the incredible stories in this discussion. After graduating from college he started his career on Wall Street. He was away from the game of lacrosse until he returned to the States after working overseas for 11 years. He started coaching with Highland in 2008-ish as the Head Coach for the 5/6 grade C team. Over the years he has steadily worked his way up through the coaching ranks at Highland Park. He is beginning his third season as the Highland Park DI Head Coach. Anyone who knows the first thing about Texas Lacrosse knows about the long history of success at Highland Park. I set out at the beginning of this episode to answer one question – “What is Highland Park doing differently than the rest of us?”. I think this discussion goes a long way towards answering that question.

David grew up near Baltimore Maryland and played his high school ball at Gillman. After a successful high school career he attended the United States Naval Academy and played lacrosse all four years. After his career at the Naval Academy he served our country in the United States Navy. It is in the Navy where he first coached at the youth level while he was stationed in California. David spent some time as a volunteer coach at NAPS where the coaching bug really caught hold. He subsequently coached at Furman as the program was starting there and later at the United States Air Force Academy. This interview was a blast. Between David, conducting the interview on Caven Field and the soundtrack from the girls field hockey practice it was just all around cool. This is one of those interviews where I felt like I added very little to the content. David is the real deal and we should all take some time to understand how he is growing young men at St. John's and what we can take from him back to our teams.

This is just a podcast of two lacrosse nerds talking about Houston lacrosse at the local public library... until a security guard ran us off. Jeremy grew up in Syracuse, NY. He played his high school lacrosse at West Genesee High School and his college lacrosse at Springfield College in western Massachusetts where he graduated with an undergraduate degree and two masters degrees. He has been coaching in Houston since 2007. He began his local coaching career at The Kinkaid School. He is currently the Head Lacrosse Coach for Kingwood. He has also spent time coaching in Europe. Jeremy has made pretty dramatic progress in his relationship with Kingwood ISD. The Kingwood program has access to resources most programs do not enjoy. This podcast includes some really good discussion about his success in Kingwood and the challenges public high school-based teams face in Houston... right up to the point where the night time security guard ran us off...

Tim is a local product. He started playing lacrosse while he was in high school at Strake Jesuit. He played in college at the University of Houston. He started coaching some of the first boys lacrosse in Richmond and followed his first group of players through youth into their high school years. Tim was the first coach for the Richmond Tigers. Last season was his final season coaching high school lacrosse. He is now focusing his efforts on building the local men's lacrosse scene. He is the founder, manager and chief spiritual leader of the St. Arnold's Men's Lacrosse Team. Most importantly Tim is an advocate of pickup lacrosse. For years Tim has been hosting and organizing pickup lacrosse games. Tim recognizes the important role of pickup lacrosse and he walks the walk when it comes to doing the work required to make those games a reality. This episode in another keeper...

Blake Skinner represents a group of coaches and administrators who have put together a proposal to change the way we govern and organize high school lacrosse in Texas. This is a great discussion about the details of their proposal, what they hope to achieve, as well as some of the practical implications of the proposal. Put your thinking cap on and spend some time to listening to this episode...

Mike Donnelly is a local legend and that is not an overstatement. Mike first arrived on the Houston Lacrosse scene in 1981 when he started playing competative men's club lacrosse. He played competative mens lacrosse for the next 16 years in Houston. Mike is still playing lacrosse now. His passion for the game of lacrosse and his enjoyment of teaching naturally lead him to a career in coaching. I believe he is the only high school coach in Texas to lead both a girls varsity team and a boys varsity team to the state semi-finals. Mike is currently the Boys Head Coach at Episcopal High School in Texas. Mike's passion for our sport is infectious. If you spend any time at all with him it will rub off on you. A few words from Mike Donnelly: I failed to mention and would like to add, Drew Webb (Cornell), Jim Weiss (Princeton), Travis Bryan (Syracuse), Steven Gibbs (Dartmouth) were the early recruits from Texas and still arguably the best. When Drew lost his battle with depression Dr. David Lintner (Cornell great defensive man and current local pro teams doctor ) and his wife Katie founded the 7s for 7 tournament to raise money to help fight depression. David and Katie have inspired so many and raised so much money over the last decade for this cause. Drew’s former teammates, USA TEAM members and so many players of all ages have participated each January.

Kiernan is the Director of 3d Lacrosse in Houston. He is currently the Head Coach at Memorial High School here in Houston. Kiernan started playing in Western Canada when he was growing up. He played at Claremont High School in Victoria, BC Canada and at Mars Hill University. He has coached at the college, high school and youth levels. This episode includes some great discussion around growing up playing lacrosse in Western Canada, the Western Lacrosse Association, the Knights youth lacrosse organization and what’s working in the local lacrosse scene relative to his experience with lacrosse in western Canada. This is another great listen. Thanks to Kiernan for sitting down and talking to me.

You will have a hard time convincing me there is a better boys lacrosse coach than John Perouty. John has played the game his entire life beginning in Maryland. He played his high school ball in Baltimore and his college ball for Coach Edell at the University of Maryland. He has been coaching locally in Houston since here arrived here in 2005. He recently took on a new role as a high school lacrosse official here in the greater Houston area. This episode is awesome. There are some great personal stories, a lot of really good local history and some perspectives on where the sport stands in the Houston area. This is a long episode... but worth every minute.

Taylor Brooks is currently the Head Coach for the Atascocita Lacrosse organization. He is responsible for all aspects of coaching and development from the varsity team all the way down to the little guys. Taylor started playing lacrosse here locally when he was in middle school for the Iron Eagles in Cypress. He played his high school lacrosse for the Cy-Fair Ironmen and went on to a college career at LeMoyne. After finshing up his college career he came back to Houston to serve the sport in a coaching capacity. Last season was his third season at the coaching helm of Atascocita Lacrosse. His perspective on the game locally spans time as a fresh recruit to the sport, a player and a coach. This is a great discussion to kick off this podcast. I am grateful for Taylor stepping up to be the first interview and help me learn how to conduct these podcasts.

This is a quick introduction to the purpose and thoughts behind the Houston Lacrosse Project.