So here goes nothin...

A bit delayed...

So here i sit in the san fransico airport...just waiting. Our trip to Japan has been delayed a couple hours due to a fuel leak, we had all boarded the plane and were ready to take off and then the pilot gave us the scoop, and asked everyone to get off the plane. We should be taking off again here hopefully within an hour or so. go figure there'd be a delay on after a 6 am wake up call. it's going to be a long day.

So...USA West 2008. I'm more than stoked to be given the opportunity to be playing with 23 of some of the best players on the West Coast. It's been fun getting to know everyone but names have been tough to figure out. We have about 8 guys from Minnesota-Duluth, all are pretty impressive players. Off the field, I can't get enough of their Minnesota accents...classic. The rest of the team is a bit of a mixture: 4 Sonoma players, one of who is Cito Williams, one of the best attackmen to play in the MCLA, he's fun to watch. We have two Michigan guys-National Champions of 2008, both are workhorses, a faceoff guy and a longpole. Other schools include Texas, Cal-Poly, Claremont, Colorado State, and one guy for Army-Brooks Korvin who's got a great finish.

Training Camp in the Bay...

The heat was tough to get used to at first; we played two tough days of camp over at Bishop-O'Dowd, a private school in Oakland. Nice turf which made it fun to run up and down on, but tough on the feet. The first day we did a lot of scrimmaging, and I was immediately impressed at the speed and skill level we came out with. It's fun knowing you can move the ball anywhere on the field and know that player's gonna know what to do with it. The coaches do a great job of keeping things really relaxed, but intense at the same time. The majority of the guys on the roster are all upperclassmen or graduated, with a few exceptions. They treat us with that level of maturity but also expect us to return the favor.

Noah Fink, head coach of Texas is the head coach of USA West for 2008. Helping him out are two California guys - Rob Warner and Tyler Kreitz. They did a great job of running training camp, keeping it fun and giving us the chance to really get after it. I'm more than confident that they will be able to help us win games in Japan.

A little Japanese lesson-

I'm the only one on the team with any sort of Japanese experience. And although I feel as if my Japanese skills have slipped in the past year because I haven't taken any classes, I'm confident I'll be able to get myself around. At a meeting yesterday morning, I gave the team a mini Japanese lesson, giving them the essentials such as "I don't understand" and "where is the bathroom?". Coach Tyler gave us a good example of the exotic cuisine we may be exposed to: telling us about a memorable experience he had when hanging out with his host brother: Eating a half-dead, uncooked squid. Yum.

The host families we will be staying with are all lacrosse families, so the players will most likely all speak some level of English. I will most likely be put in a situation where the family has a very limited English vocabulary, and my Japanese will probably come in handy. These families are all on waiting lists to become hosts for American players, so they are very enthusiastic about having us come to Japan. We will be teaching a couple of clinics here and there to do our best as "ambassadors" of the game. Going to Japan on my trip right after High School was a fun experience, but I'm excited to get the chance to play Lacrosse internationally and apply my skills as a Japanese Minor (A double major would not have allowed me to fully enjoy the social life is lived my senior year, but I'm not too bummed about that).

Some other thoughts:

Playing midfield was something I should have done all year at Oregon. I feel like I was best placed as an attackmen last year with our talented midfield, but this was a different year and we had different personnel. Defense is tough to get used to but I feel like I'm definitely holding my own. A lack of (quality) coaching led to lots of problems this year, and I have no doubt that Joe "coach of the year" Kerwin would have made me play middie from the get-go. I feel like a threatening force on the midfield, and enjoying creating from up top and shooting on the run. I put a couple away on Garret Fitzgerald from Colorado State, who shut me out when we played them this year in Ft. Collins. He's a good keep and I think he'll really show up in Japan.

Post graduation celebration weekend, it was tough at first to get my strength back after so much partying, but I was definitely in good enough shape to get up and down the field in a hurry. Being the first to leave on Sunday was a bit tough; I've loved every minute of living on 1625 Hilyard, and Eugene has been a fun place the last 4 years. I can't wait to live there this summer; lots of friends in town as well as female interests... ;) Summer has always been my favorite time of year, and this is really the best way to kick it off. Japan is going to be AWESOME.
















I never knew I had it in me to write this much...I hope the family and friends that get a chance to see this blog can get a grasp on what it's like to be along on the adventure with me.
PICTURES ARE COMING!!!