For some, the end of finals brings visions of the beach, sleeping late, and summer jobs. For a growing number of Cardinal athletes, summer means club sports teams. While experts debate the long-term benefits of nonstop participation, particularly in only one sport, area athletes increasingly turn to club participation in the off season to improve their skills. Ireton freshman Sadaf Najafzadeh tried the last “open gym” session available last August for volleyball and fell in love she said. “Miss Gutmann encouraged me to play, in a good way, and I am glad she did,” said the outside hitter. “I like to play tennis and softball, but I joined a volleyball club to play in the off season and it has really helped me improve.” She suggests that she is not only a stronger player, but understands the game, the strategy, and the techniques much better from increased participation. “I want to play volleyball my entire high school career, and my goal is to be a good varsity player.”
Coach-of-the-year Steve Tela, Ireton’s girls’ lacrosse mentor, has no doubts about the value of summer club teams and coaches one himself. “There is a direct correlation between the success of our girls’ lacrosse program and the number of players who are members of select lacrosse clubs. In 2005 we had 5 girls playing club lacrosse. In 2009 every member of the varsity team was on a club team. In order for us to be competitive in the WCAC and our nonconference schedule our players have to be under the guidance of superior coaching and top competition in the summer and fall and that comes through the clubs.” At 19-4 during the recent spring campaign, Ireton’s girls’ lacrosse program saw Ashton Hellmuth become the School’s initial first team all-Met performer in the almost 20 years of the program’s history, two others selected second team, two honorably mentioned, and seven seniors going on to play college division I lacrosse next season. “Our record the past few years (36-9) clearly supports that philosophy and we have a record number of girls playing at the division I level as well.”
Victor Zare, father of all WCAC second baseman Frankie Zare, agreed. “Club/travel baseball made Frankie a much better ballplayer than he otherwise could have been. The exposure to top-notch players, coaches, and competition was invaluable. The opportunity for college coaches to see him play was a plus as well.” Zare says it was impossible to imagine his son playing at the same level without the additional participation.
Athletic director Bill Simmons is supportive, but up to a point. “There is no doubt that every sport these days has year-round opportunities. I worry that we can burn out young people when they participate in only one sport nearly year round. Ireton, in particular, needs good athletes to play more than one sport for us to field competitive teams. Increasingly, college coaches suggest that multi-sport athletes are less likely to suffer physical injuries from overuse or repetitive motion problems than is a single-sport athlete. They like to see a lacrosse player on the soccer field in the fall. There is also the mental fatigue aspect that can just take the joy from the game and cause some kids to simply walk away from it.”
Simmons suggests it is important for players and families to examine why they play. “If athletes are playing club and focusing year around for the love of the game, I am their biggest fan,” commented the Ireton AD. “but if it is the drive for college scholarship money, I think the reality, at Ireton anyway, is that the average graduate’s academic scholarship is greater than the average athletic grant, and comes without all the obligations. When you look at it, no one is getting a “full ride” athletically, but we do see some generous academic awards each year. Maybe going to the beach and actually doing the summer reading will pay more dividends in the long run than playing all summer in the hopes of catching a coach’s eye.”
Club obligations can complicate life in high school as well. While Tela points out that club lacrosse does not cross over into the high school season, others, like soccer often do. For soccer players, in-season weekdays are typically devoted to high school teams while Friday night through Sunday belong to the travel club team. Some WCAC coaches scale back their schedules or weekday practices to avoid wearing out a teen who may play four or more games a weekend and may rarely see a day off during a high school season. Ice hockey follows a similar pattern, and in extreme cases, some club teams have prohibited players from playing in certain situations for their high schools as a condition of club participation. Bishop O’Connell’s Chris Bond and Alex Guerere were teammates on a junior national hockey club team with such a rule. Bond elected to sit out the Knights’ 2009 NVSHL championship game while Guerere played and was bounced off the junior national squad as a result.
Perhaps no sport is so organized as basketball with its AAU programs. Teams compete for players and may travel nationally, as companies like UnderArmor and Nike financially support the top-tier programs. In some cases, the AAU coaches have begun to supplant the traditional high school coach as mentor for top senior players, often to the chagrin of college recruiters and certainly high school coaches. High school supporters suggest the AAU motivation is often questionable as to whether the coach or the players are the ultimate beneficiaries. They lament AAU programs don’t have the same academic concerns, don’t deal with personal development as do high school coaches, their focus is only basketball. AAU supporters counter that they don’t look to replace the high school program, rather they provide the exceptionally talented players an opportunity to compete with similarly talented players on a regular basis, something impossible to replicate consistently at the high school level.
All of which points to the need for families and players to evaluate their objectives in undertaking club participation. Even Simmons conceded his daughter is a summer club lacrosse player. “My wife and I are out there a number of weekends in the summer, up and down the mid-Atlantic watching girls’ lacrosse. I think we are doing it for the right reasons, my daughter loves lacrosse and wants to play as long as she can. As long as she enjoys it, it is something we want to support.”
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