At giant lacrosse tournament, organizers see room for growth

Published 12:00 am Monday, July 25, 2016

By numbers alone, the Oregon Lacrosse Classic is striking: three days, four tournament sites on the east side of Bend, 12 separate age and gender divisions, 18 fields, 70 game officials, 152 teams, more than 3,300 players and an indeterminate number of lacrosse balls lost during pregame warmups.

In short, the Oregon Lacrosse Classic, now in its third year, has gotten really, really big.

“I didn’t really have a number in mind of where I thought we would be in year three,” OLC director Ryan Powell said on the first day of the tournament on Friday. “I’m extremely pleased with where we are, but I think there’s room for more (teams), and I want to see the sport of lacrosse grow in Oregon.

“We want this to be the biggest tournament in the country, that’s my goal, and we have a little ways to go before we get there, but we are the largest tournament in the Pacific Northwest.”

Joey Lucchesi, a coach for the Tacoma, Washington-based U17 South Sound Starz, said he sees the Oregon Lacrosse Classic as a way to determine how much his team has improved during the summer season.

“This is our big finale,” Lucchesi said after his team opened the tournament with a 7-2 win over Team NorCal on Friday evening. “It’s the biggest tournament we go to. But it’s been fun coaching (this team), because we’ve been coaching them since May. We want to see them grow completely as a team, and it’s cool to see how they’ve progressed at each tournament. Just in this last game, we told them this was their most complete game of the season, so we’re hoping we can go for a little playoff run, go for a little championship, and end the year on a good note.”

Jojo Boston and Ashley Stokes, both 14 and from Southern California, made the trip to Bend with their siblings, but most of their OC Crush teammates decided not to leave California for the tournament. So instead of spending three days sitting on the sidelines, Boston and Stokes joined the Bend Rebels as guest players for the weekend.

“At first I was pretty nervous, because I wasn’t sure if we were going to be able to play a lot or if (the Bend Rebels) were going to be nice, but it turns out they’re super nice,” Boston said as she and Stokes watched one of the OC Crush boys teams play. “And we played the whole game, pretty much.”

Unlike the U17 South Sound Starz, the Bend U11 boys team is just beginning their season.

“The team has only been together for a couple of weeks, and everyone has different backgrounds in lacrosse, so they’re pretty excited,” coach David Kelly said as his team warmed up for their first game of the tournament at Buckingham Elementary School on Friday evening. “Most of the teams that we’re playing with come from programs that start much younger than ours do — a lot of other cities have programs where they start in first grade. They play year-round in some instances, because the weather permits it, and a lot of times they’ve been playing together for years, so we expect competition in our division to be pretty stiff.”

Kelly said his goals for the U11 Lava Bears were simple: “Nobody gets injured, and everybody has fun.”

“Beyond that, we don’t care,” Kelly said. “This is a fun weekend of lacrosse, and if we get a win or two, fantastic. If we get beat 20-0, as long as the kids are learning and having fun and loving the game of lacrosse, that’s all we care about.”

— Reporter: 541-383-0305, vjacobsen@bendbulletin.com.