Navy's Syd Abernethy Part 4

In high school I indentified with attackman like Mike O’Neil and, after a 1981 Army Navy NCAA lacrosse playoff game, Syd Abernethy. I also idolized Army’s great defensemen Bob Henry who covered Syd that game; Abernethy scored four goals on Henry to advance the midshipmen to semi-finals. Henry would go on to earn first team All-American that year and defensemen of the year honors; Abernethy earned first team All American honors too becoming the second African American to do so at the division 1 level since Jim Brown in 1957. Seeing Syd play that day made a big impression on me; it said to me that this was my game too as an African American. “In those days, lacrosse was still an exotic game and I saw very few blacks playing or black youth in the stands or after games asking for my autograph,” recalls Abernethy. I clearly remember that game in May of 1981 and the impact of seeing Syd play off the hook that day did a tremendous amount for my psyche as young black kid playing a white dominated sport. Navy would go on to lose to a tough Carolina team in Carolina in the semi-finals.

Syd Abernathy: http://lacrossememoir.blogspot.com/search?q=syd

Guest Blogger Navy Coach Rick Sowell Part1: http://lacrossememoir.blogspot.com/2010/04/rick-sowell-on-how-he-started-playiing.html

Navy Head Coach Rick Sowell on How to “Really Play Part 2:  http://lacrossememoir.blogspot.com/2010/04/rick-sowell-learning-how-to-really-play.html?spref=tw

Navy Coach Rick Sowell: http://www.navysports.com/sports/m-lacros/mtt/sowell_rick00.html

Wining Coach Sowell’s Way: http://www.americanathletemag.com/ArticleView/tabid/156/ArticleID/142/Winning-Beyond-the-Game.aspx

Interview with Coach Sowell: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XimZNwcXWcg&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqphHerSL8I

Navy's Syd Abernethy Part 1

 Navy vs. Hopkins game circa 1978 

Syd “the squid” Abernethy gained his nickname for his patented head and shoulder fake at the attack position that allowed him to blow by defensemen and score bunches of points during his lacrosse career. A lot of young players today of all stripes know nothing about him. I witnessed his game first hand and I think his story is important for serious fans and students of the game. A tall well-built attackman with powerful legs and blinding speed, Abernethy was born at John’s Hopkins University Hospital in 1958. He grew up in Annapolis, Maryland where he first played middle school lacrosse at the Key school and then later for a Hopkins’ lacrosse alum, Dave Roberts, at Annapolis High School located down the street from the U. S. Naval Academy. At Annapolis High, he excelled both at athletics and academics where he achieved high school lacrosse All-American honors. His brother, who was three years older than him, played as a walk on defensemen at the Naval Academy for Hall of Fame Navy coach Dick Szlasa. Syd received offers to play college ball at West Point, Yale, and Navy and he chose to follow his brother to Navy in the summer of 1977. More on Syd and the role he played as part of Navy’s triple threat offense tomorrow.

Syd Abernathy: http://lacrossememoir.blogspot.com/search?q=syd

Guest Blogger Navy Coach Rick Sowell Parts1: http://lacrossememoir.blogspot.com/2010/04/rick-sowell-on-how-he-started-playiing.html

Navy Head Coach Rick Sowell on How to “Really Play Part 2:  http://lacrossememoir.blogspot.com/2010/04/rick-sowell-learning-how-to-really-play.html?spref=tw

Navy Coach Rick Sowell: http://www.navysports.com/sports/m-lacros/mtt/sowell_rick00.html

Wining Coach Sowell’s Way: http://www.americanathletemag.com/ArticleView/tabid/156/ArticleID/142/Winning-Beyond-the-Game.aspx

Interview with Coach Sowell: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XimZNwcXWcg&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqphHerSL8I

Navy's Syd Abernethy Part 2

Me playing attack against Suffern High School in 1981 in Rockland County, New York 

When Syd Abernethy enrolled in the Naval Academy, the school had a reputation for great attackman including Hall of Famers Jimmy Lewis (Uniondale 64-66), Jeff Long (Irondequoit 74-77), Brendan Schneck (Syosset 77-78), and Mike Buzzell (West Genesse 77-80). Abernethy continued that tradition going on to start at the attack position as a sophomore. After Schneck transferred to Hopkins to play midfield, Abernethy, Buzzell, and Dickie Wheman developed into a triple threat on attack before Buzzell graduated two years later. Abernethy would earn honorable mention All American honors his junior year, “the next year I just outworked everyone, coming to practice early and leaving late,” says Abernethy, and his hard work paid off. I asked him if he ever experienced racism during his high school or college playing days. “No, people in Baltimore knew lacrosse and my performance on the field spoke for itself and I never experienced it on the lacrosse field,” says Abernethy. 

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Syd Abernathy Series: http://lacrossememoir.blogspot.com/search?q=syd

Listen to Our Podcasts and More: http://www.fredopie.co

Navy's Syd Abernathy Part 3

West Point's Michie Stadium 

I had the honor to see Syd Abernethy play my senior year in high school in Croton and his senior year in college at the Naval Academy in a quarterfinal NCAA playoff game at West Point in 1981. Before that game, I had never heard of him. In addition, it was my first time seeing an African American in game, and one who clearly was one of the best players on the field and one who played my position too—attack. Many people don’t know I was an attackman in high school.

West Point Lacrosse History: http://grfx.cstv.com/photos/schools/army/sports/m-lacros/auto_pdf/2011-12/misc_non_event/2012lacrosseguide.pdf

My Earliest Exposure to Lacrosse: http://lacrossememoir.blogspot.com/search?q=elliot

Croton and Yorktown Lacrosse: http://lacrossememoir.blogspot.com/2010/01/be-steve-mabus-in-your-lacrosse-world.html

Do You Recruit the Hardest Worker or the Most Talented?

related links below

My Hard Work and Lacrosse Stories: http://lacrossememoir.blogspot.com/search?q=%22hard+work%22

Roddy Marino: http://apps.uslacrosse.org/museum/halloffame/view_profile.php?prof_id=335

Rick Sowell: http://lacrossememoir.blogspot.com/search?q=Rick+Sowell+

Dave Urick: http://lacrossememoir.blogspot.com/search?q=+Urick

Syd Abernathy: http://lacrossememoir.blogspot.com/search?q=syd

Ed Howard on The Desire to Win and Be the Best

Ed Howard in the spring of 1979 after winning the Graham Award as the team’s best defenseman, the Kraus Memorial Trophy as Hobart’s most outstanding senior athlete, and the Roger Frankel Award as the senior who contributed the most to the Hobart community during his undergraduate career. 

Ed Howard earned second team All Americans his junior year at Hobart College and he was named a co-team captain and first team All American his senior year. As the caption above shows, Ed also received a plethora of honors at Hobart's 1979 sports banquet. “Ed was one of those student athletes who made you look like you knew what you were doing, says Dave Urick, the Head Lacrosse Coach at Georgetown University and Ed’s defensive Coach at Hobart. “In junior high school I lived to go to the Hobart practices every day after school,” says University of Virginia Associate Head Lacrosse Coach Marc Van Arsdale. “Guys like Ed Howard were my heroes. Ed was one of the guys who always took time to talk to me in the locker room before or after practice. He wasn't boisterous, but he was always friendly and thoughtful in his dealings with a 13 year old kid hanging around a team of college men.” Van Arsdale, insists, “my experiences as a ball boy . . . probably had a great deal to do with my decision to enter the coaching profession. Similarly, after a Hobart Mt Washington Lacrosse Club down in Baltimore as part of his last spring spent in the south as a collegiate athlete. A guy from Morgan State University (a historically black college and University) came up to him and said, “man you have no idea what that poster of you means to so of us down here, so many [African American lacrosse players] have one,” the guy said. Like Navy’s Syd Abernethy, Ed has no stories of throngs of black kids swarming after games seeking his autograph. But he knew folks were watching him and as a result, he says, I “tried to represent Hobart College the best I could, that’s all.” He adds, “I had an insatiable desire to win and to be the absolute best I could be,” and that’s what Ed focused on not on being any bodies role model as Charles Barkley would say. Both Ed and Syd Abernethy had no idea the impact their careers had on me as an African American adolescent just starting to play lacrosse. Marc Van Arsdale argues that “Maybe it was part of Ed's legacy that in 1987 the Hobart team had 2 African American Captains—Tim Clark (Henniger) and Ray “Tiny” Crawford (Manhasset).


My Series on Hobart All American Ed Howard: http://lacrossememoir.blogspot.com/search?q=Ed+Howard

What I Found When I Returned to Lacrosse After Ten Years

Syracuse University Lacrosse All-American and Hall of Famer Jim Brown 

 Former Syracuse University Lacrosse Player Fred Opie

Jim Brown Lacrosse Stories: http://lacrossememoir.blogspot.com/search?q=Jim+Brown

Navy’s African American All American Syd Abernethy: http://lacrossememoir.blogspot.com/search?q=Abernethy

Navy’s African American Head Coach Rick Sowell: http://lacrossememoir.blogspot.com/search?q=Rick+Sowell+

Integrating the U. S. National Team Tryouts in 89: http://lacrossememoir.blogspot.com/2010/04/integrated-us-national-team-tryout-in.html

My Earliest Exposure to Lacrosse: http://lacrossememoir.blogspot.com/search?q=elliot

Allan Hodish and Hempstead Lacrosse

Click this image to enlarge and read this 1980 article on Hempstead Youth Lacrosse. That's coach Allan Hodish  in the photo on the left. Guest blogger Aaron Jones reflects on what Hodish brought to Hempstead many years ago. Jones went on from Hempstead to play at Cornell in the late 1980s where he appeared in a National Championship game against John Hopkins.

[Guest blogger Aaron Jones] My relationship with this game started from unique circumstances. Let me give you a little insight into my background so you can understand what I mean by “unique circumstances.” Hempstead, Long Island in 1975 was not unlike most communities of its time, very homogeneous in its makeup. In Hempstead, there were people of similar backgrounds that lived together side by side to form a close nit community. Hempstead was almost entirely an African American community. It was a proud community of modest means but deep in its history of athletic prowess at every level. Year after year football, basketball, baseball and track teams from youth levels all the way up through high school varsity sports were successfully competing on their athletic playing fields throughout long island and beyond. The Salvation Army youth basketball team was famed around the world for its dominance. The varsity basketball team was a feature story in the local and regional news seemingly every year for its accomplishments on the court. The football team was as successful as the others, always fairing very well in league competition. I think you get the point, in Hempstead athletic excellence was the norm year in & year out! Around that time a new gentlemen came into the Hempstead community with an eye on bringing a new sport to the town. He was very different from the normal Hempstead coach, Jewish by faith, outspoken by nature, and caring to his core! Alan Hodish began touring the Hempstead streets with his Toyota Celica hatchback encouraging Hempstead youth to make their way to the local park. There Hodish demonstrated a new sport called lacrosse and influenced scores of boys to give the game a shot. I was one of those young kids picking up this foreign sport for the first time and through it I earned an opportunity to attend Cornell University where I played lacrosse in the 1980s.

Jim Brown Lacrosse All American: http://lacrossememoir.blogspot.com/search?q=Jim+Brown

Navy’s African American All American Syd Abernethy: http://lacrossememoir.blogspot.com/search?q=Abernethy

Hobart’s African American All American Ed Howard: http://lacrossememoir.blogspot.com/search?q=Ed+Howard