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THE MULTI-SPORT THROWBACK SHARPENED HER GAME AND MADE ALL THE RIGHT MOVES
Boca Raton, Florida – Being a point guard for a highly regarded basketball team is fun, but it requires great time management to go from one sport to another if you have another sport that is important for you to play. Especially in Florida where there are 2-3 weeks cross-over time between the seasons. In the era of student-athlete excuses, and rigid ill-informed coaches who force kids to specialize, Mer Donaldson’s commitment to both games makes her somewhat of a throwback.
Blame it on her midwestern rearing. Her family is originally from Kansas, where basketball is king, and lacrosse is a city in Wisconsin.
Mer trains with a personal trainer (oddly enough who played for me when I was coaching the Ravens). She played AAU basketball. She played for her high school basketball and lacrosse teams. And she joined LaxManiax this year because about midway through her junior year she realized that lacrosse was her favorite sport. She was not ‘head-hunted’ out of South Florida by another club “all-star” team because she was very low key. And all-star teams prefer to take lacrosse players over athletes.
But athletes make the lacrosse world-go-round! Fire me if I don’t take the athletes into Laxmaniax simply because they lack polish! Everyone who did not play youth ball lacks polish. Even then, only a small percentage of those kids is a true ‘all-star’.
Playing lacrosse like a basketball player, Mer Donaldson earned several looks from Division I programs because of her athletic ability and quickness. Mer will continue her post-high school career at Quinnipiac University, a Division I program in Connecticut.
Mer made herself an all-star with her addictive personality and grinding work ethic. Call her the Rod Brind’Amour of the LaxManiax.
Mer stands at just 5′2″, but her dodging skills are point-guard-esk. She weaves and rolls through the attacking zone and somehow she is always in position to take a shot. Or have a good look at the goal. She can weave through traffic as a result of her size and superior quickness and vision. During the IWLCA tournaments, in just 5 games played she scored 14 goals and had a handful of assists.
During the Heatwave tournament, she danced and weaved her team to a championship and was a difference maker in the games on playoff Sunday. Her late goals sealed wins against the other top teams of the tournament. True to Mer’s style of grinding and working through pain or unpleasantry, she experienced heat illness during the first game of the Heatwave tournament and vomited early in the game. Sent off the field for a breather and some water, she returned under a minute later and demanded to be put back in the game. The team had only one substitute for the tournament. She wanted to not be that one sub.
One college coach asked about Mer said “If I could get my hands of an entire attack like her, and refine her skills and stick while I taught my system, you would not stop my attack no matter what you ran.”
The coach is right. No matter how vaunted your defense is, speed and athletic ability beat it. And the more Mer surrounds herself with lacrosse balls, sticks, and goals, the more she will perfect the art of scoring. She already has the art of dodging down pat.
“I want to thank everyone with the club for their help and guidance. I could have never made it without you (the organization). I chose Quinnipiac because they provided me with a great opportunity and an awesome coach (Danie Caro) who I know can bring out my best in college. They gave me a great offer and their program is very competitive.” commented Mer Donaldson. “I am honored to play for Coach Caro. I wanted to play lacrosse up north, so I am really happy.”
The Qunnipiac Bobcats were conference runners up last season and included wins over Brown and UConn. They scored a season high 24 goals against St. Francis. Their final record of 13-3 was one of the best in program history.
Based on her quote, she may be more similar to a throwback than I even thought before the interview!
Lake Mary, Florida – The combine was over two years ago, but what the results showed was that of the more than 600 athletes ever to be times on the girls end, only one was the fastest. Morgan Derner. And of the fastest, those timed who were under 5.4 seconds in the 40-yard dash, just a handful were even close to her 5.0-second sprint. That time is fast for even track sprinters on the women’s side. In fact, the average 40-yard dash was almost a second (5.8 vs. 5.0) slower. A full 50% of those tested were more than 1-second slower in a 40-yard dash than Derner. And what does that all mean to you and I?
Morgan Derner, is the Burner. Speed Burner that is.
Derner played for her rec club, LM Lax Club, and her elite club, Team Florida '10 Black, at the Heatwave Championships in July. While she may have been too tired to repeat as Braveheart Champion for 2009, she helped her elite team win the tournament with an undefeated record.
But what does 1-second mean? It means about 8-yards of speed in a 40-yard race. If you run a 40-yard dash in 6.3 seconds, which is close to average for a high school sophomore playing lacrosse, you are a full 12-yards away from Morgan when she crosses the finish line. You run 72% of the race in the same time she completes the race. So if you are marking Morgan at the midfield center line, she will be getting ready to crank a shot and you will be somewhere near the 15-meter area screaming “Help!” “Slide!”, or something else. Maybe you will just be saying a quick prayer (there is little time for any other kind) to empower your goalie.
If you are even one of the fast players, say a 5.5 second 40-yard dasher, as many of the DI recruits are, you are in not much of a better predicament. You are beaten by three or four steps. In a game where allowing a great player just a step is enough to give up an easy goal, you may as well run the 40-yard dash in 6.3 seconds.
Either way, Morgan has the potential for great things as she matures in the game. She has been through two head coaches at the high school level. No one has really taken the time to get to know her as a player. The club has been the one measure of consistency that she has had, and the club’s motto is to be coached by a variety of people to learn different methods of teaching and understand different styles. All of this variety has helped Morgan show well and have major Division I interest. At the same time, her background has scared away some top programs who have not understood the phenomenon.
Morgan's (right) 15 goals and 9 assists at the SAT earned her co-MVP honors with Lake Brantley GK Heather Gable (left) at the summer's kickoff event in Peachtree City, Georgia.
But if you ask me, or you ask Gary Gait, or Torrey McGowan, or Mike Waldvogal, they would say that it really doesn’t matter much what you see if you only catch 15-minutes of a club game. If you look at two factors, production and measureables (like the 40), you can see that Derner is perhaps the best prospect for any program available in the game today. Productivity like:
35 goals and 9 assists in 11 games at the highest recruiting tournaments this summer. If you projected that into a 22 game college season, she would score 70 goals and 18 assists. Keep in mind, the two games at the Champions Cup were just 35 minutes each – barely a full game at the college level.
77 goals and 45 assists in 18 games at the high school level (6.8 points per game) for a program under new leadership and playing a pretty tough schedule.
49 high school varsity games played in three years. All as a starter. More than 232 total points. And she still has one more year of school to go.
Made 1st team all-Conference in WEIGHT LIFTING at the 129lb weight class. She is strong and she is fast and she is goal oriented.
So, the production does matter in this case, whereas in some cases, the level of high school competition played in the south is so poor that players could score 100 goals in a season and really not be a top-level prospect. In Morgan’s case, her strong measureables combine with her outstanding production to verify that she is actually all that.
And she still needs to prove that she has a dominating left hand…over the next five years! Five years is a LONG TIME to develop all that other stuff. Plenty of time for someone like Morgan!
And now Morgan has made it clear, the Burner will be lighting up the fields and the scoreboards of Florida for a few more seasons. Morgan has chosen Jacksonville University as her home. Much to the delight of lax fans on the First Coast, who have another local gal to cheer for at the Division I level.
“I am so excited about my decision to attend JU.” commented Morgan.
Well said. And also a very QUICK quote from the Burner!
The Burner. Need I write more?
Parkland, Florida – Another goal keeper from LaxManiax has made her choice to attend college and player NCAA lacrosse! Kelsey Harvey becomes the 9th goal keeper from the LaxManiax Elite over the past four years to earn an NCAA opportunity. But the real story is not the LaxManiax Elite program. It’s all Kelsey Harvey.
Quick and athletic, Kelsey Harvey has dazzled opponents over the past two years with the LaxManiax club! Photo courtesy of John Lagrow.
Last Fall I can remember thinking as a club director how deep our club has been in goal keepers over the past three seasons. When I contemplated the 2010 goal keepers, another deep class featuring some of the most talented keepers in the south, I would not have guessed that Kelsey Harvey would be the first to commit.
But like any great one, this goal keeper proved the critics wrong!
Kelsey plays for a good club high school (Douglas High School) program in south Florida. They battle each season for the championship of the 24-team Florida club high school championships. And each of the past three seasons, they have been in the game thanks to the services of a goal keeper named Kelsey Harvey. Kelsey stands all of 5′ tall. She moves like a cat in the cage and plays field as well, which is probably why her new soon-to-be college coach loves her so much.
Douglas GK Kelsey Harvey (in cage) teamed with defender and 2011 Maniax standout Jennifer Nardone to help Coach Ivy Warren's squad to another state final's berth in 2009. Kelsey, who also can play in the field, will take her quickness and instincts to the next level as a senior and beyond!
She has played for two seasons in the LaxManiax Elite club. We first noticed her three summers ago at the Florida Sunshine Cup, put on by Dan Wood and Tom Losier in Clearwater Beach. She was very athletic. She was playing on a team of South Florida all-stars for coach Ivy Warren. Her team faced an up hill challenge against our Maniax 10-11 team. She faced perhaps as many as 40 shots in the game, saving 25 and allowing 15. For those of you who are new to the game, that is one heck of an effort for a GK!
Thankfully and without any enticing on our end, she showed up at the tryouts for the South Florida Maniax program the following January. She and Dani Weidemeyer (Navy) put on a great showing for me as I was the coach working with GK’s at the tryout. Once again, I was impressed by her butterful style.
Her first year in the club was an adjustment year. Playing travel club lacrosse is an adjustment for anyone, but for Kelsey it was especially tough being pushed into the mix of kids from more established varsity programs. She was also challenged by my staff and I who would not accept her just being comfortable with herself as she was.
And adapt she did! She responded to the challenge by working hard and being positive!
She grew more as a person and player than any player in the history of the LaxManiax Elite program. She truly did. I cannot say that it had much to do with all the GK instruction at Maniax day, or the tournaments, or the emails and facebook time. It was all her. She matured right there before our eyes. It was awesome.
Her family shares the credit with her. An amazing group of go-getters who recognize that ultimately the opportunities are there for those who want to take advantage of them and eliminate the excuses. They are a great bunch of folks, and it is no wonder why their high school program is as good as it is despite not having full school or county support. The Harveys provide the backbone.
Kelsey fought hard and made the 2010 Black team against all odds. She had an amazing spring practice season with the club and worked so hard. Every goalie coach raved about her. I don’t know if anyone could have possibly worked harder or been more dialed into the recruiting program than Kelsey. From the Fall of 2008 until now, she did it all and worked to strengthen her weaknesses and augment her strengths.
The program that she has committed to, Notre Dame of Ohio, is one of the rising stars in Division II lacrosse. They presented her with a great offer and she became their exclusive goal keeper for the class of 2010. Coach McGowen from NDC knows what he is looking for in a GK. He was a great college GK himself and was able to work with Kelsey on the Mid-Atlantic tour at Lax University Camp. He also watched the 2010 Black team play several times against top competition from New England, New York, Maryland and DC. He knows he is getting a GK that can take the heat and who has no problem playing in a pressure defense, similar to what he runs on the college level.
One of the up and coming programs in Division II, Kelsey Harvey will be the only scholarship Goal Keeper in the class of 2010 for the Falcons.
It has been a great summer for Kelsey! Best part is, Kelsey wants to keep playing this Fall! She wants to keep working on her skills against great competition. Even though she has already committed and has decided on her place for the next 4-years, she wants to go to the Fall tournaments and help the other 2010’s and 2011’s find their homes too – while she continues to hone her instincts and prepare for her senior season at Douglass High School.
And that my friends, is all you need to know about Kelsey Harvey! What a team player! What a goalie!
