S1 E7. Traversing the Labyrinth: John De Tommaso & Brad McLam, Part I

In this first portion, of our next three part series, we learn how the Johns Hopkins teams of the mid 1980s, with arguably the greatest defense known to Division 1 Men's Lacrosse, achieved greatness, winning two national titles with three finals appearances, and four final fours spanning the careers of our guests from 1983-1986.

Both players have been recognized as All Americans, national champions, and hall of famers, as well as youth, high school, college, and professional coaches.  

We start off hearing of our guest's humble beginnings as High School multi sport athletes growing up on Long Island, and then progress to when these two freshman roommates met for the first time and how they have continued to be the best of friends ever since. And yes, we'll discover they've stayed not only connected to each other but connected to the sport of lacrosse, with their friends, with their families, and with just about anyone who shows an interest. 

Enjoy the pure positive energy emanating from these two highly accomplished, knowledgeable, and enthusiastic lacrosse legends. 

If you like what you hear, please subscribe and write a review. It helps support the podcast and helps keep the episodes flowing. 

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Transcript

Jay: 0:00

It's time for get the La Scoop, a podcast bringing you all the people and stuff you should know. In the game of lacrosse, we take LAX seriously, but ourselves, not so much. Join hosts, big Dog and Jaybird, and the biggest names in the game. Brought to you by Jay McMahon lacrosse. That's J M L Skills, mindset, and LAX IQ training. Ron Doish, the big dog, was a collegiate football and lacrosse player at Brown. He was also an assistant lacrosse coach and the executive director of the sports found. and Jay McMahon, the Jaybird, a three time All-American Midfielder Brown. He was a captain of the US Junior National team and is the founder of J M L. And joining us in the studio, Steve gfi, who's collegiate lacrosse career statistics equals one goal against Dartmouth. Both of our guests today were part of what was arguably the greatest defense ever assembled in Division one Men's Lacrosse at Johns Hopkins University in the early to mid 1980s. Our first guest was an All-American defenseman and graduate of Farmingdale High School on Long Island, as well as a four-time All-American at Johns Hopkins University earning First Team Honors in 19 84, 19 85 and 86, and as a freshman in 1983, he was an honorable mention All American. He led Johns Hopkins to consecutive national Championships in 1984, in 1985, and was the recipient of the Spicer Award as a nation's most outstanding defenseman in 1985. He was named the J H U Team MVP in 1986. He was their defensive MVP in 19 84, 85, and 86. He was named to the all-time J H U team in 1986 and the silver anniversary team in 1995. He played on four US national teams in 19 86, 19 90, 19 94 and 1998. Jay, did you say four world teams? Yeah, four. Four. Hard to believe guys. He's gotta be an Iron man. I was his personal trainer back then. There you go. All four teams won world championships and he was selected the tournament team and was the outstanding defenseman in the 1994 World Championships. He was a six time US, C L a All star, and was selected as the club player of the year in 1989. And on top of all that, he coached the Long Island lizards to the inaugural Major League Lacrosse Championship in 2001. He's a member of pretty much every hall of fame lacrosse has to offer, and we don't have all nights. We're gonna move on from there. Last but not least, he's purported to be a huge Elvis fanatic, which of course we will delve into later in the broadcast. Please, everyone give us a warm welcome to the one, the only John de Tomaso. Hey, deto. Deto. Brad. Brad. Now be honest. Have you tired of that, that introduction over the years moment? I left a lot of help. Come on. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you very, very much. Thank you. Now look, I get the honor of introducing another Johns Hopkins legend, as you can see over his right shoulder. Number 27 at Johns Hopkins. Brad Hails from this is a short high school title, Brad Half Hollow Hills West High School, long Island. Where he is in both the football and Lacrosse Hall of Fame. He went on to obviously play with John at Hopkins. And was a two-time all-American and I,, Brad, I didn't know this, the first long stick, the first pole ever to be an All-American. So you were really a pioneer in what's become. I think one of the most important positions of the in the game today. And I understand, you know, Dave Petro owes everything to you. That's my understanding of the way it's kind of worked and to both of'em, John, lacrosse history, right? He'd be nothing without you two. Now in addition to this another thing very near and dear to my heart. I mean, Brad, let's be clear. These one sport guys, very limiting. They're very impressive when they play one sport. I like you, Brad. Two sport guy, lacrosse and football, showing our multi-dimensional athletic ability. A three time all centennial conference, football player at the hop. He also coached at the division one level. Running the defense for L I U Post holds a master's degree in movement. And is also on the staff of the Rebels Lacrosse Club. Brad, we are really excited to have you here today with us. This is really special, as Jay said. I grew up in Annapolis and went to St. Mary's High School, so Brian Wood and Craig Bobier Legends, the Clubber, Greg Lilly his his younger brother was my best friend. So I really, I really fell in love with the game of lacrosse, watching you guys play on, on Homewood. So we're really grateful to have you here today. Well, thanks for having us. Really appreciate it. Yeah, appreciate it. Appreciate it. Definitely. All right. Now John, we always like to start at the beginning and how did you first start playing lacrosse? Yeah, so lacrosse you know, started to grow in Farmingdale. I'd say. You know, in the seventies and then through the eighties the real influence on my lacrosse career was my brother, my older brother played through high school. And I really began to play, I think my first year was in eighth grade. And then really just from there, I, I, I went, you know, obviously I went to Farmdale High School. I played football, lacrosse, and really, like Brad, honestly wanted to be a football player for the longest time because Farmingdale football is, you know, a pretty big deal. And it, you know, I think still is a pretty big deal. And the lacrosse was just something that I, you know, played and enjoyed. And it was something to do in the spring. And then it you know, by the time I, I would say I got to my sophomore year I was a midi and got switched to defense one day by legendary coach Bob Hart raft. Mm-hmm. And Bob takes credit for everything in, in, in my career, and I appreciate that and I'm thankful to him. Almost, you know, truthfully, as much as anybody in my career, you know, other than my parents and my brothers, you know, but Right. He switched me to defense in the 10th grade, and I started playing from that point forward. And then it was kind of like a whirlwind, you know, at the end of 11th grade. It was just, you know, getting recruited by all these, you know, all these schools. But I was not a, you know, typical kid that played, you know, at a very young age. In fact, I don't know many people that were in by, you know, sort of age group, you know, that really started playing like kids are today. I mean, it's not even, not even close to that. Right, right. I don't think any, but we were, we were playing at that young age, we were playing two things, maybe three things. Right. You were playing like P AAL basketball. You were playing Little League Baseball. And in Farmingdale you were playing for the Farmingdale Hawks and football and that was it. Lacrosse was, you know, I didn't, I don't even know if Farmingdale had a, you know, p a l league at that time. But that's really my introduction to the game was really through my brother. His friends played and, you know, I got to junior high school and, you know, they're like, okay, it's time to play lacrosse. I said, okay. Right. Great. Right now, what led you to Johns Hopkins? As you said you had several schools recruiting you, what led you to Hopkins? Yeah, so I think the biggest influence really ongoing Hopkins was John Kuman. John Krumer is a you know, Farmingdale and a Hopkins legend. You know really one of the great people, you know, that I've had in my life, you know, passed away. Unfortunately, very young. And he was a big deal. He was the big deal on in Long Island at that time. Definitely in Nassau County. Mm-hmm. I mean, crew was just this, you know, from a very, and he was a kid from a young age. Like he played, you know, varsity lacrosse in the ninth grade and really nobody did back then because the junior high school was at a separate place from the high school. Right, right, right. So nobody was ending school later driving up to go to practice. Nobody did that. And he was this ninth grade kid that played on this great 1978 Farmingdale team and his, and is really, he was such a great player that when his choices came down to a, really narrowed it down, I think it was to Virginia and to Hopkins. Mm-hmm. And I did the exact same thing. And I think just the fact that he was. And I was familiar with him. Mm-hmm. We were friends. I think that was clearly the, the biggest influence. You know, the other factor for me was that it was closer to home. You know, I could feel better about being four hours away from home as opposed to seven and a half hours away from home. I didn't even, you know, speak to Caroline because oh my God, that was, you know, 10 hours away. There's no way I was going, that's galaxy away, you know, going, yeah. There was no way I was going to do that. So that's really, that's really what it came down to. John Crewman went to Johns Hopkins. And I was gonna follow him at Johns Hopkins and, and interestingly enough, that led to Bruce Cuck the next year who was a high school, all American. He then went to Hopkins right after that, was a guy named Joe Resn Pollock. Oh yeah. Who was ran island. He went to Hopkins. Right. My brother was 1985. He went to Hopkins. Like it continued that Farmingdale Hopkins tra tradit. Right. For quite a long time. But it all, it all started with John Ard, no doubt. Yeah. How lucky you guys got Ron. The Long Islanders got down to Hopkins and we all Yeah, that's right. Made we all know without the same words. Made'em what they were. Kids scoring goals all year long. Yeah. Right, right, right, right, right. Well, all John, we gonna, John, John, are we gonna let Brad say anything? I mean, what, Brad, go ahead, ask her question, Ron. That's alright. Brad, step in. Greg, he's used to this. I like to be in the ba I like to be in the background, you know? Yeah. He, you do my job and I'm in the background, you know. So, Brad, how, how about you tell us how you got into the game and then. And then how big, you know, the football lacrosse thing, was that really important to you? Yeah. Oh yeah. Did you wanna play both in college and, and by the way, Ron, we should have mentioned, we should have mentioned Brad's in the Hall of Fame at, of Hopkins for lacrosse and football. So holds records in football to this day so that again, that was in there. Somehow it didn't get red. Anyway, look, look at Jay criticizing my, my introduction. Come on, let's go. Good Lord. Get together. It's intolerable, Brad. Yeah, well my journey is similar to John's in some, in some cases, but, you know, I had a dad who was I don't think, I don't know if John even knows this, but he was in the whole, he's in the Hall of Fame at U University of Vermont for three sports. Wow. So I, you know, I try, I couldn't live up to my dad, although, I will tell you when I was down at Hopkins that I did consider trying out for basketball. You know, we had, Mitch did one year and Yeah. Yeah. I love basketball. I played basketball at Hills West. We had a good basketball team. But anyway, yeah, Brad was a good basketball player. Yeah. I loved basketball as well. But my dad was a three sport athlete. He was a baseball player. He was one of those old time guys that literally said, do you wanna be a good basketball player? And he put a hoop in the garage. He said, there's the hoop. You wanna play lacrosse? Put the lacrosse goal in the backyard and say there's the goal. You know, nowadays, it's like, we get Johnny, we work with him. We'd show him how to do it. We get him a trainer. He said, do you want play? You wanna be a lacrosse player? You wanna be a basketball player? You wanna be a football player? He basically pointed out and said, how bad do you want it? And that's what, that's what motivated me as a kid. So I wanted to be a football player. I mean, as, as any kid, I grew up, I wanted to play in the nfl. But as I grew, my brother, I, I looked up to my brother, who's six years older than me now. My brother played at Washington Elite back when they were legit. Mm-hmm. They were a top 10 school. He went from the 76 to eighties. He was the biggest influence on my life, even to this day. I used to go watch him play high school football and lacrosse and you guys, I'm sure you cannot not know the name Jimmy Metzker. Sure. Jimmy Metzker played with my brother in high school and I couldn't wait to go see those guys play, whether it was lacrosse or football, you know, on Saturdays and go watch my brother play. He was a huge influence. Now I was, we were both face baseball players cuz my dad's, that was his passion. And when my brother switch switched to lacrosse when he was in ninth grade, that was really the turning point for me when I used to watch him play and I said, you know what? This is the sport for me. I'm a, I'm a football guy. I want to engage. So I, I, I played lacrosse, watching my brother. He was a huge influence to my dad's. Disappointment at the time. Cause he really want us to be baseball players, right? It's a common reframe here in these interviews. I love it. But, but he did embrace the sport. I will tell you, when he got to the college level, he really embraced it. But so that's where it started. Lacrosse journey. The, the football journey was always number one. In, in high school I got recruited for both. It was either trying to play at Rutgers or Syracuse or Delaware or UPenn was really where I wanted to go play football or somewhere I could play both Washington and Lee Hopkins. Even places like Syracuse and Rutgers either were, it was a toll order to play both. But anyway, so I wanted to play football or find a place that I could do both. And it got to Hopkins really, when it got to the point where, you know, Chiron, of course, his whole recruiting line was, he prompted a high school. And what about the you know, the scrapbook and go through the ORs and the Baltimore Sun and see like we got top billing with the Orioles and. Right. Cool. Yeah. And you know, I, I wanna play and it's great, but, you know, can I play football? He goes, well, yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, if that's what's gonna take you to get here, you wanna play football, then okay, we'll make it work. So it, it worked and it was the perfect storm because I got to play division three football and at the time I, I, I thought I could play division one, but I knew the reality was you go get redshirted, you play all year, probably two or three years. You don't even step on the field. As good as I thought I was, there was guys as good and better than I was at this deposition. But, so when I thought about it, I had the, you know, the best of both worlds at Hopkins. And I felt confident I could come in and be an impact player of a football. I wasn't as confident in lacrosse. I mean, not that I, I, I mean, arguably I'm competing against some of the best players in the country, so I was kind of playing with house money a little bit when I felt like I, I could go in there and play football and say, you know what? You know, I can do this, so let me see what I can do on lacrosse field. So it turned out work. It worked out for the best, and I think them making me an LSM was the absolute perfect position for me. You know, I could always de up guys. I was a good athlete between the lines and it was just the perfect position, but Right. You were running back for football, right? So you're used to flying up and down the field. Yeah, I was like an all-purpose guy, you know. But I will tell you, the long, the defensive midfield position originated with my brother. And if you look at Jack Emmer was one of the most innovative coaches back in the day. Yeah, right. You know, the armadillo. He saw my brother. My brother was very similar to me. His nickname was Dr. Dodge because he had a spin Dodge. He'd run up the field. He clearly, he was a clearing machine, but emer thought, said, you know what, he's a, he's great between the lines. He can defend offensively. He's okay. He's not great, but he's capable. So he gave, he gave my brother like a 50 inch stick. So eventually my brother was playing with like a, I think it was like 48 inches or it was something like, it was a mid and that's what he did. Huh? He was a clearing mid. So he really, if you wanna see the origins of where it started I don't know of another player that, you know, at that point in time, that was 76 Scott graduated in 80. Right. That's interesting. And so that kind of was the beginning, I think, of that concept. And then the fact that I kind of took the torch from there at least, you know, and by, by the way, by when I played there were guys like Dan Williams at Army was very good. Mm-hmm. That Randy Cox at Carolina, you know, like you started to see these guys emerge. Of course Steve Mitchell came along, so Right. And I was blessed to play with, you know, when I got inducted to the Hall of Fame at Hopkins, when I literally listed the guys I played with, I'm like, you know, John d Tomaso. You know, Larry Quinn, John Tucker, Brian Wood, like, I mean, Dell Dressel, Dell Dressel. I mean, you could go on and on. I mean, you know, it's crazy. Steve Mitchell. In that era I was surrounded by some really great players and really I was a role player and I accepted my role because I knew that it was very specific. And if I did it, you know, at a high level, I knew I was contributing to the team. So that's, but that's kind of where my lacrosse journey started ended. But football was always my first love. And even after leaving college, I wanted to play, try to play pro football. You know, I had a couple long journey, baby. That's a long journey. Yeah. Yeah. And I will say this, I will say this to today, everybody. He says, how did you play two sports at Hopkins and graduate in four years? And I said, if I didn't, I wouldn't have graduated in four years. Yeah. I'm telling you this today. That had budgeted my time. You know, I could, I would get outta a game on Saturday and literally go to the library for three hours before I went out on Saturday night because I ain't no choice. Wow. You know, so that's discipline right there. But nowadays, when I hear kids who go to college who don't even play a sport and they can't graduate in four years, I say to myself, how. Right, right. You know, you, you know, Jay, I mean Brad, just a typical roleplaying hall of famer at Hopkins. Right. Just a role playing hall. A humble Hall of Famer. Hall of Famer. Yeah. There you go. Now, now, John, tell us, you know, a little bit about your experience at J H U and when you first met Brad. I know you guys would like to talk about the relationships and the game of lacrosse and tell us what it was like when you first got there. Did you guys know each other ahead of time or meet once you got there? Yeah, I was. See, the truth is, I was, you know, it's interesting cause they didn't even bring up football to me, by the way. I was, there was no way I was gonna play. And you were, and you were a good player, right? In high school, and by the way, Brad I was all island football in 1982. The difference is I wanted to play footballs like I'm, I'm playing football, so maybe, no, I didn't even, honestly, I didn't even think about it and it was not even a choice. And. You know, Brad and I we, we met we met before Dee, that summer, Brad, in the year we met before it was like a summer league game. Yeah, yeah. Either you were working at it and I came to see summer, but Brad, so we met before that and I think we got along right away. We lived in a room that was about the size of like it was an eight by 10, so we probably Yeah, we roomed together freshman year. Yeah. Oh, really? We both reached our hands over to each other. Yeah. Like spread out on the bed. We probably would've touched each other. Right. But Brad got there early, so Brad was in camp, you know, early on, and so he was training. I just, you know, so the room was there and set up and, and I arrived, you know, when I arrived. And truthfully, you know, Brad was really busy, you know, practicing and, and, and with football and all. Yeah, yeah. With football. And we started fall across, but my journey at Hopkins was, You know, really, honestly, quite difficult. I loved it. I loved the guys. There was no, but I, I was miserable. I mean, I missed home. I was grew up in a, a close family and you know, it, these weird Baltimore people around, it had to be tough. Yeah. Yeah. Baltimore people, I mean, I was the ultimate. I don't think I left Long Island except on trips. My father was director of guidance, so we'd go to Gettysburg and we'd go to Washington and, you know, every now and then we'd venture you down to Orlando. But, so I was absolutely miserable at Hopkins in the fall. Mm-hmm. I really, I wanted to be home. I literally called every day. My parents have a stack of letters like this from my parents. Who writes a letter. Who writes a letter now. Right. You know, I can remember. Making collect calls, credit card calls. I can you remember people had a credit card number? Yeah. And 8 billion people used the credit card number where they came from. I don't know. Right. What we called on a payphone with a credit card number. So I had a really, you know, kind of rocky time at the beginning. I, my father eventually were great parents. I had incredible parents and, you know, they did everything. They, they, they, they could to, you know, like, keep me up. Your father would bring down sauce and meatballs. Oh, forget. I mean, it was, it was honestly continuous, you know, their support. And eventually my father said, you know, okay, listen, you're miserable. You're making everybody miserable, you know, come home, you know, if you still want to play, you can play locally. No problem. Come home. And I was like, Hmm, damn it, I'm not going home. Right. You know, like, now you're telling me to come home. Now I'm not gonna come home. And. I can remember Henry Cerone, who was the head coach of the legendary head coach. You know, our first year. I mean, I, Jimmy Aman was that if you know Jimmy Amman's a long time, you know Nassau County ad and really coach and wonderful man at Paul Bread and the two of us know really well, and everybody at Hopkins in those days did, and you know, I think Chick at one point during the fall said to at least this is what Jimmy tells me, like, who is this kid? Like, you have to be wrong about this kid because I didn't, you know, if you're not happy, right. Like, like we tell our kids, our own kids. Yeah. And now the kids that we work with, if you're not happy during the day, you know, it's easy to say be happy for two hours because it's something you love, but you can't. Right, right. So I wasn't, I certainly, I don't know, remember how I was playing, but apparently not too well. And at the end of the fall, When I knew, like I was going home, we had a scrimmage, like against M L C at the time. Mm-hmm. And Chick said to me, okay, now let's see what he could do. Go cover Dave Codo, believe it or not. Oh, really? Yeah. Dave was a great player. Dave was a great player for m l and he was like, I don't care what you do, I want you to beat him up a little bit. And I was like, what? Like really? Okay. And then I, you know, then I could, you know, play. Then I felt like, okay, I knew that this was, you know, either I was going home soon for Thanksgiving or the break and Right. It was, I, I really could write a book on sickness, truthfully, I probably should have as I became an educator. And so after that you felt like you settled in, you had had a moment there? A little bit, yeah. I knew when I came back from the break, Uhhuh, you know, to go back, like if I'm gonna be here, Then I'm gonna play. Right? Like, hey, that's the way this thing is gonna go. And, and my time there. Honestly, I value it now so much. And the program and the history, right, and the tradition. Well I was looking back at some of the highlights on YouTube and wanted to ask you, you know, you were playing against some of the best all-time attack men, and that was really a golden age of lacrosse. I mean, you had Mack Ford at U N C, you had Roddy Marina at uva. Of course you had Tim Nelson at Syracuse. I mean, you played against them all. And, and you did, you know, you, you kind of got the better of all those amazing attack men. What was it? Who's the toughest guy to cover? And and what was that like playing against guys like that? Good question. You know listen, all those guys are great. So getting the better of them, you get the better of them because, you know, somebody makes a slide and. You know, helps you out. You get the better them because Larry Quinn makes a great save. And you know, nobody sees that. You know? What about that back check off the roll Dodge? That was working. Yeah. A run. You know, every now you get lucky, you know, you get lucky. Right. So, but it's like one of those things where, you know, you, you rely on everybody else. Yeah. It started to be a good run and that became a thing like, you know, we're going to shut somebody out. Like, I'm not gonna give up goals. Like, this person's gonna be taken out of the game. Or this person's gonna take themselves out of the, their self out of the game by going to the crease, play against Marilyn. The guy stood at the, like, the end line, you know, like the midline, you know? So that was all Yeah. Mean. I think we took part of a great defense. Really. Uhhuh. No, I, I think we imposed our will on people after a while. I think collectively. I mean, you had Larry in the cage deto down low. I mean, you know, I, I just think that defensively we are very well coached. Freddy Smith, you know, best I ever had. I mean, the guy you don't even know, that's a guy you, you probably never even heard, but he is the legend of, of, of defensive lacrosse. Fred Smith. Mm-hmm. He was a graduate in 1950 of a Hopkins team that I think played four years and didn't lose a game and they considered themselves the greatest group. But he was this gentleman at that point, he was probably, you know, 60 years old. You know, he could coach today. He could relate to the kids. He was brilliant and he was kind and he was compassionate and he was the defense and he was a volunteer and he ran the whole defense and he was legendary at Hopkins. And he is, there's Bill Tierney about, you know, who people consider, you know, I speak to Bill, I've spoken to Bill one time a week for the last, you know mm-hmm. Since I graduated. And you had, you talked to Bill and you listened to him talk about who was the greatest influence on his lacrosse career. In terms of coaching, it's Fred Smith. Wow. It's a name that's like, this was just, that's amazing. A volunteer assistant, right? Yeah. That's incredible. But the But the what? Yeah. I mean in the numbers right away, over a couple years, really hard, there was only Paulino, who's that? Paulino was a, was an attachment from Army. I mean, he was quick and he was fast. And freshman year, you know, we played Army and the first time I went out to cover him, he went by me. Three seconds and he dragged the stick and he, it either fell out the back or I want to say I checked it. Yeah. Right. And he didn't get it off. And at that, after that point, that was a battle because I knew that he could run by me. And that was, you know, late in freshman year. And it, it was, wasn't happening that often, but he was really tough. I don't know what he's doing now, but he listens to the podcast Paulino. Right. Guy I that, it's funny cause one time I asked Dave Petal the same question and he mentioned an attack from Army. I can't remember the guy's name, but that's funny. But Jay, a couple of, couple of things here. You know, you know what I love for kids today? I don't think if you look at Detto at your resume, you're gonna say, oh my God, this is a guy who almost left Hopkins. Right. You know, and that, that sense of kids today who don't know what it is to persevere, to stick with it. You know, and, and to, to think about that or they're on the fence a little bit. Right? Yeah, definitely. I, I don't think there's any doubt about it. That's why I really did a dis, you know, I spent a lot of time in my career educationally, both as a coach and then as an administrator. And whenever I got into discussions about the college process or kids going to, or they were student athletes or not, you know, it is, it is that adjustment to life. Right. You know, here I am living with, you know, my case, living with my younger brother in a, in a room, you know, probably five feet from him my whole life. Mm-hmm. You know, dinner was at the same time, you know, I was, I I think I got, you know, the whole thing, you know, growing up with, with great parents, great brothers. I loved Farmingdale, I loved my experience in schools. You know, there was, there was a great group of friends and you know, you caught up in the recruiting process and yeah, this is incredible. And I was driving down to Hopkins passing. With my parents passing St. Paul's. I think when you, isn't St. Paul. Not St. Paul's Loyola. Loyola. It's like on, on Charles Street, like, or somewhere on the way. And I'm like in the backseat and I'm literally crying and my father says, you know, John, you know, I know you're upset. I know it's gonna be okay. You see this? We didn't even know what the high school was and we didn't know what Loyola Lakefield was. I mean, anytime. And said, look at Loyola Playfield. See this high school? I'm sure there are, there's kids that play lacrosse there that would, that would love to go, you know, to Hopkins. And I was like, I'm sure there is. But I, you know, and poor Brad, I mean, he was like, got a deal with me, you know, like this miserable son of a gun. It's like, well, I gotta tell you one funny story. Well, Soto's freshman year, He gets the starting. Be careful, bro. Be careful right now. No, no, no, no, no. And he, and we, and we're playing playing Virginia and who's this attack when? Virginia, his senior? Marino. Roddy Marino? No, wasn't Marino. Oh, oh, oh. Mike Carvan. Avan. Oh yeah, yeah. Carvan. So Deto gets the starting nod. I think the first game, I don't know, he's playing this, he's playing caravan. He's a freshman. He didn't, I'm, I'm his roommate. I'm living, you know, I sleeping like 10 feet away from him. He had me up all night. Matt Caravan or up, like caravan. Like he, I mean he had me, you know, he was thinking about that matchup the whole night. That's great. Yeah. You know, so he was dialed in the night before and you know, the rest is history from there. I mean, that was his first game, you know, matched up against, I think he was a senior at the time, right? He was a senior. He was a great, he was a great attack for, yeah, it was a great attack. When of course Henry Chick Chick hated him because he like, I mean it was like this Rev, it was like this, you cover caravan And he did this to us three years ago, you know? Cause before that, Brad, if you remember, I was playing up and down, I would play the mid east, I'd play up, I'd get matched up and play pole against whatever midfielder and then go back down and play attack. But caravan was that first like real, like matchup that, that against a big attack that first night before his first game. Oh my God. And now, Brad, for you too, I mean you were playing against some of the most talented. People, you know, in, in the, the country as well. I mean, yeah, I, and, and my question for you was, who is tougher, you know, Brad Cox at Syracuse or Todd Curry, or Joey Seigal at unc, or the guys are going up against him practice, right? Del Dres. No, I'll tell you. Not not John Tucker. You guys are all great players. I have tremendous respect for them. Believe it in, I mean, Dell Dressel and I used to go at it, a practice. Yeah. I mean, to this day I see Dell, literally, I saw him two weeks ago and Oh wow. I mean, he, we just went at it like literally battled. And I, and I literally got outta the car. He two were down there, two weeks show at Hopkins. At that reunion. I said, Dell, we made each other better. We really did. And now, now it's my turn to tell story of Brett. So you know, Brad Hi. Hi. His senior year, right? So, so in 1986, our senior year, he was having a great year. Really great year. And oh no, this might have been your, this was probably your junior year, but this was your junior. So we're, we're practicing on Homewood and Brad is covering Dell. And, and really we in, in, in, in that time the defense versus the offense was like a, been insane Dell. It was like, and people don't know. Dell Dressel was one of the only four time first team. That's true. Americans. There's only like three or four of them. But anyway, go there. And Dell was great. Dell was was great, but Dell, the defense in the offense would go at it. And even, we even had separate parts of the locker room. Like the defense was on one, the offenses on the other side. That's hilarious. I don't think anyone does that anymore, but we were literally on our own side. That's great. And it was a challenge, like we were challenged every. And Brad was going at it with Dell so hard. And, and I love Dell and I said this to him and I think he mentioned it over the break and we always, we saw him, we always ventured to him, but Brad was so under his skin and, and so dominating him. One day that Dell stopped the ball up top, turned and fired it on the University Parkway. Why you? Huge road. Yeah. Holy cow. If you know it's a huge road that goes right by the field, you launched it over the bleachers, which aren't the bleachers today. The bleachers today are like, the stands actually like a stadium. They were bleachers at that point that went around. He launched shit, all the wes all, and we hald and we, I mean, it was like the defense. We couldn't have got any higher at that point. So you're right, we played against great players, but playing against Dell every day. Yeah. I mean he, no, and we, we see each other to this day, every time we see each other. Yeah. We had like this kinship, like literally I, you know so it, so you're saying now you could be on the same side of the locker room, is that what you're saying? Yeah. Right. Yeah, yeah. Exactly, exactly. Going on. That was awesome. But I'll tell you actually, other side people did, other guys, which they were all great players and I had to cover'em and, and you know, a lot of the, what we did was, you know, I was always like, I'm gonna make you work for the ball a little bit, see how much you really want it. You know, a lot of it's psychology. After a while I think we, we took guys out of the game and mm-hmm. That's something younger players don't really understand the psychol. I try to teach my kids, my son. And how you can beat somebody mentally before they even, you know, cover you or, you know, and that is something I think the older players, the older generation, I think some of the younger kids don't have that savvy right. But anyway, the only other guy, I would say, not older, a lot of guys, but a guy that's kind of off the radar was JC Connolly from Towson. Huh? You remember him? Yeah, he was, he was a, he was a little mid who was a pain in the ass. Yeah. And I remember, I, he was, I did not want to cover him. He was, he just never stopped moving, you know, not good. And like if I, it was the kind of guy, like that was a guy that gave me, you know, like, yeah. Didn't, you know, you know what was tough too was the midfield that year, all years. What was his, was it Tim Westell or Tom? No, no, from Garden City. He, Tim, he gave me fit. He gave me, he, he's another guy. He was like, He was like, you six two fans. Well, he took me to The Wing. I, yeah, I should say that. I give him, I have to give him props cause he took me to The Wing, which I never played. You know, goal Line extended. I think he scored a couple of goals and I was like, I was smart because we never really practiced playing, you know, wing dodging. We just didn't do a lot of work there cuz guys didn't operate then. Mm-hmm So that was definitely a really effective guy. That kid. That kid was tough. He was strong. Yes. They were great. You're having any great guys, Brad covered in that time? Oh my God. You go up and down the, up and down the list. Yeah. Amazing. I just, I remember tho those games, like there was some, those games I like they just, the battles that, that would happen in those games. It was, and it, I don't know. It was, it was something about it was, it seemed anyway, like it was much more a mono, a mono kind of game. Like you and me, let's go. I mean, I know there was team defensive concept, but it wasn't, it didn't seem like what it is today. It was a lot more just let's go you and me. That's absolutely true. I'll tell you that individual matchups defenses were much more simple. Yeah. You know, I've spent a year, you know, last year at St. John's, you know, I, I didn't, wasn't the defensive coordinator, but just, you know, looking at it, it's, it's much more complicated. Mm-hmm. When one of the defenses that we played that we really relied on, now granted, for, for those years, at least a couple of years with Larry Quinn in the Gold, you could really do that. Yeah. You could really do this, which was, we called it like a, whatever, a ACC name it was where you literally played your guy with no backup. Yeah. So it was on an island exactly what you're talking about. Yeah. We are going to match up all over the field, and if you get beat, we may come. But there's no set, you know, rotation down, come across, you know? Right. Switch. We played, we played a lot. My, most of the defense we played, I think, was really in that, you know, absolutely. Environment. Absolutely. Now it's very, now it's, it seems a lot more complicated now. Offenses may be more complicated. I don't think so. It's all still all about movement, but there are the, the switching and the packages that are put in the different slide packages. You know, we just, we played a base seven man defense, which was six guys on a goalie, and that was what we called it, seven. We relied on, you know, each other. And then we played this a ACC defense, which was just, as you said, you know, it was, it was your matchup and. If, if six of us won it, we'd be in good shape. Right. You know, that's the way it worked. You're, you're on your own now. You know, one of the main themes of our podcast, we'll change gears a little bit, is to give these prospective college bound players news that they can use, so to speak, you know, with regard to the recruiting and individual training processes. So John, I understand that the two of you guys have teamed up to provide guidance to a select group of high schoolers. And can you tell us a little bit of how seeing your own children go through the process led you to believe that there was need for improvement and how your service helps kind of fill that void?

39:10

Here are the answer to that very important question. You'll need to tune in next week. John and Brad have really become a couple of pros at the college lacrosse prep and recruiting game. We're so excited for them to share with you their wealth of knowledge on this important topic. That will happen next Wednesday. When the second part of our three-part series with these two absolute lacrosse legends EHRs.

Jay: 39:36

And until we meet again, here to, hoping you find the twine. We're signing off here,

39:42

don't forget to like comment, share and subscribe to our, get the lax scoop podcast. Also, you can check out videos at our Facebook page at Jane McMahon lacrosse or on Instagram at J McMahon lax 23. Or check out our. Full podcast with video on our YouTube channel, along with the video of the week. And as coach Sergeant used to say to us, Take care of yourselves, take care of each other.