Redmond Lacrosse Club teaches basics of growing sport

If your children are itching to try something new besides baseball or soccer, one of the city’s newest non-profit sports organizations may be just what they are looking for.

Redmond Lacrosse Club (RLC) was formed just last year when the only youth lacrosse organization on the Eastside since the 1980s split and formed a Northshore division, fueling the need for local kids to get back onto the field.

A STORIED HISTORY

Lacrosse is known as the oldest team sport in the world, dating back to the 1100s in Mexico and in future centuries with Native American tribes, particularly the Iroquois, in North America.

Tribes would often solve disputes by holding lacrosse contests, which usually involved hundreds of tribe members.

The modern game is played with a ball and stick called a “crosse” with a net on the end. The object is to pass the ball around the field using the crosse and get the ball into the opponent’s goal, located in the back middle of the field in a team’s territory, much like hockey.

“Lacrosse is a lot more active than baseball,” said RLC president Charlie Dougherty, who wants to see lacrosse become a sanctioned high school sport. “If you’re on the field, you’re going, you’re involved all the time. It involves teamwork, and as you get better it’s truly a team sport.”

Being a full-contact activity, the physicality and teamwork required of lacrosse has become a hit with football players from Redmond and Lake Washington high schools.

“I like the fast-paced intensity of it, being with my teammates, and the communication,” said Redmond High senior Sean Shewey, who has been playing lacrosse since junior high. “We have a lot of fun out here, that’s the key to our unity.”

“It seems that when a kid picks up a stick and plays once or twice, they get hooked,” added Dougherty, whose son Tyler plays for the RLC high school team.

“Our goal is to give the Redmond community somewhere to play, a structure to play within.”

As club president, he also seeks to build a strong program with a solid foundation ­— with the hope that the sport will eventually be sanctioned by the Washington Interscholastic Activities Association.

“The way a successful program works is to be able to go from top to bottom,” said Dougherty, who pulled all of the independent grade-level teams together before last season. “The intent was to try and get one organization that could streamline the whole process, starting with a lot of feeder teams.”

CROSSE COACHING

Redmond’s Jean-Claude “J.C.” de Raoulx has been coaching lacrosse for the last 11 years, and enjoys every minute of it.

de Raoulx played collegiate lacrosse for the Wesleyan Cardinals in Connecticut, and just last year, coached the Central Washington University men’s lacrosse team to their first-ever playoff appearance.

“Lacrosse is a unique and exciting sport combining elements found in soccer, basketball, hockey, rugby and football,” Raoulx explained. “Anyone who has played becomes a member of a worldwide fraternity or sorority of current and past players, young and old.”

The experienced coach led the RLC team to a fantastic 9-1 season, ending in a Division-II Cascade Conference championship. Yet, he will only be seen coaching youth in grades eight and under during the offseason, from August through the beginning of March.

As an accredited high school coach, de Raoulx must conform to the established rules of the WIAA, which prohibit organized contact with athletes out of the sport’s designated season.

“I enjoy seeing my charges pick up a passion for the game,” de Raoulx said. “Some day they will be in my shoes, and will share their enthusiasm and love for the game with others as I have with them.”

Redmond Lacrosse Club practices at Perrigo Park on Sunday afternoons from 1-3 p.m. For more information and to sign up to play lacrosse in Redmond, visit www.redmondlacrosse.com.

Redmond Reporter Sports Reporter Tim Watanabe can be reached at twatanabe@redmond-reporter.com or (425) 867-0353, ext. 5054.

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