CLICK HERE to read original article - written by Kennebec Journal Staff Writer Randy Whitehouse
WATERVILLE — Eddie Donnell Jr. occasionally wondered what it would be like to pick up a lacrosse stick. Usually knee-deep in football, basketball and track and field at Gardiner Area High School, he liked the physical nature of the sport while watching.
"I'd always wanted to play but it wasn't really in the budget for me in high school," Donnell said.
Lacrosse was the furthest thing from Donnell's mind as a sophomore at St. Joseph's College when David Beriau, the Monks' new head lacrosse coach at the time, approached the 6-foot 1, 225-pound former all-conference lineman with an idea.
"I was just playing pick-up basketball. The coach saw me and asked me if I wanted to play," said Donnell, a senior. "I told him I'd never played before, and he said, 'I'll get you started, because I really need defensive players.'
"I liked it right away. It was pretty fun," added the nursing major.
Beriau threw Donnell into the fire almost immediately. He cracked the starting lineup on defense early in his sophomore season. He ended up starting eight of 13 games that year and 13 of 14 as a junior. This year, he has two ground balls and three turnovers caused for the 2-4 Monks.
Donnell is now a co-captain for the Monks, who picked up their second win of the season with a 9-5 victory at Thomas College on Sunday. Lining up across from him on Smith Field for Thomas was another local athlete who took up lacrosse as a college sophomore and went on to become a senior co-captain, midfielder Kade Strout of Richmond.
Strout played soccer, baseball and some basketball at Richmond High School, and continued playing soccer his freshman and senior years at Thomas. A friend on the lacrosse team convinced him to try the sport.
"It was hard at first, but then after a year of playing, you really get into it," he said. "It's a game that you can pick up easily as long as you do the work every day."
Strout, a sports management major, played in 12 games as a sophomore, then became a regular in the midfield as a junior, starting 12 of 13 games and registering six goals and two assists.
Strout said he was excited to have former Husson University coach Marsh Gray take over the program for his senior year. The Terriers are 0-2 and rebuilding, so Strout is hoping to set a good example for others who might be fairly new to lacrosse, as he was not so long ago.
"It's all about hard work. You don't want kids to join the program and think that it's going to be lackadaisical," he said.
The Thomas women's lacrosse team has another local newcomer to the sport just starting out. Freshman Cassidy West, of Vassalboro and Erskine Academy, has played in all three games for the Terriers.
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Saint Joseph's College is Maine's only Catholic liberal arts college, providing a supportive, personalized and career-focused education for more than 100 years. From its 474-acre campus on the shores of Sebago Lake, the College offers more than 40 undergraduate programs to a population of approximately 1,000 students. Saint Joseph's College Online provides certificates, undergraduate and advanced degrees for working adults through an online learning program. For more, visit www.sjcme.edu.
