S2 E13. Mikey Likes It! 2X DIII National Semi-Finalist, CNU HC Mikey Thompson, Part I

This episode of 'Get The Lax Scoop' podcast features an in-depth interview with Mikey Thompson, the head coach of Christopher Newport University's men's lacrosse program. The episode explores Thompson's successful career, both as a player and coach, highlighting his time at the University of Virginia, his professional play, and his impactful coaching tenure at Christopher Newport University. 

Thompson discusses the significant milestones of his career, including NCAA tournament berths, national rankings, player accolades, and the quick rise of CNU's lacrosse program to national prominence. He shares his early love for lacrosse, family influences, multi-sport high school experiences alongside quarterback Russell Wilson, and his mindset towards preparation and adversity. 

The episode also touches on leadership, the importance of mindset in sports, overcoming personal and professional challenges, and the lasting impact of author Victor Frankl's philosophy on Thompson's approach to life and coaching.

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Transcript

Jay: 0:00

It's time for get the La Scoop, a podcast bringing you all the people and stuff you should know. In the game of lacrosse, we take LAX seriously, but ourselves, not so much. Join hosts, big Dog and Jaybird, and the biggest names in the game. Brought to you by Jay McMahon lacrosse. That's J M L Skills, mindset, and LAX IQ training. Ron Doish, the big dog, was a collegiate football and lacrosse player at Brown. He was also an assistant lacrosse coach and the executive director of the sports found. and Jay McMahon, the Jaybird, a three time All-American Midfielder Brown. He was a captain of the US Junior National team and is the founder of J M L. And joining us in the studio, Steve gfi, who's collegiate lacrosse career statistics equals one goal against Dartmouth. Brought to you by Jay McMahon lacrosse. That's J M L Skills, mindset, and LAX IQ training. Helping the next generation cross players. Get to the next level.

0:59

All right, ladies and gentlemen, we're deep into the spring, which means things are heating up in the lax season, and we're ready for another episode of Get The Lax Scoop. Jay, somewhat nice to see you. Ronald, get to work, excited to see our guest. So it's going to be a great night. Jay got a great division three head coach with us tonight. And why don't you tell us about him? Absolutely. Our next guest is the head coach of Christopher Newport university's men's lacrosse program. He has helped the captains establish a new standard of success. while building the program into a consistent power on the D3 national stage. After spending four seasons as an assistant coach at CNU, beginning in the fall of 2011, he was elevated to head coach in 2016. During his time in Newport News, Virginia, he has helped CNU earn five NCAA tournament berths, climbed to the top of the U. S. ILA national coaches poll, and shattered nearly every conceivable record. Since taking the reins of the team in 2016, he's compiled a record of 106 wins to 35 losses, including a 30 to 11 ledger in the conference action. Meanwhile, the captains have also made their mark nationally, winning eight games in the NCA tournament, including incredible runs to the final In 2021 and 2023 for his efforts on the sideline, he was celebrated along with his assistants as the IMLC a region three coaching staff of the year following the 2021 and the 2022 campaigns rounding out his honors. He was selected as the coast to coast athletic conference coach of the year after and the N. C. A. Quarter finals in 2022. Incredibly, since 1990, no Division III men's lacrosse team has gone from its inaugural season to the national semifinals quicker than the captains did after our next guest helped Christopher Newport reach the Final Four in only the program's 15th year of existence. Earning respect for the program's success, Christopher Newport broke into the U. S. ILA National Coaches Bowl for the first time during his first season as head coach. Since then, the squad has been a mainstay in the rankings. Under his guidance, Randy Foster became the team's first player to earn All American honors in 2016. Since then, 18 other players have collected national plaudits, including a USILA National Player and Defenseman of the Year, a National Shortstick Defensive Middie of the Year, and in 2023, a national defenseman and a midfielder of the year. Equally successful in the classroom, his program has produced 16 U. S. ILA Scholar All Americans. Arriving at CNU in the fall of 2011, he brought championship level experience as both a player and coach from his days at the University of Virginia. During his senior year in Charlottesville, He served as one of Virginia's three captains and led the team's 2010 ACC title run. The following year, after transitioning to the sidelines, he kicked off his coaching career helping UVA win their first title. The National Championship in 2011. After his time with the Wahoos, he was selected, in the 2011 supplemental draft by the Denver Outlaws of Major League Lacrosse. In 2023. He rejoined the pro ranks as an assistant with the cannons lacrosse club of the premier lacrosse league, a 2006 graduate of the collegiate school located in Richmond, Virginia. He reaped multiple all prep league and all American honors in lacrosse and let his team to the state title his senior year in football. He also earned league and state honors contributed mightily to two state championships along with his teammate quarterback Russell Wilson. Not only that. He could hustle like Russell and became one of Wilson's go to guys on the Gridiron. Please welcome our next guest, the one, the only, Mikey Thompson. Welcome. Yeah, thank you very much. It's great to be here with you guys. Awesome. We can't wait. Mikey, Mikey, we never cut you short on the never sling you short on the intro there, Mikey. I mean, that's, Jay does a hell of a job there. I cut that way down. That was, that was dog's text today. You might want to do a shorter intro on these guys. Oh, please Jay. Jesus. Come on Ron. Just take away glory from this young man. Let's go. I can't say I've ever read that whole thing or heard it read, but our sports information director Kenny Klein is the best in the business. He is good. And that, that was about, that was about half of it, honestly. And I, I put in some big words in there, you know, I'm not a bad writer either, but I don't need the credit. It's okay. Ron, could you please start? Jay, I'd be happy to. So Mikey, one of the things, you know, you look at that resume, right? And you've coached and played at the highest levels of the game. And we always think it's fun to go back to like, what was the first spark? You know, where do you remember first kind of developing a love of the game? Some people early in your, your career or your life that really fueled your passion for lacrosse? Yeah. Yeah, well, it starts with the family. My, my grandfather was a captain at UVA way back in the day. And you know, we kind of had that love of Virginia lacrosse,, deeply ingrained is a family early on. And my dad played two sports in college as well. He played lacrosse and football at Hampton Sydney College. And so I just remember growing up, going up to Charlottesville and watching those games on the Hill at a pretty young age. And that's kind of what I always wanted to do. I just, I love the sport right from the start. I was also me and two of my buddies were were ball boys for collegiate school. We're in like, you know, first and second grade. And I always remember thinking it was pretty cool to be able to leave school early to go travel with the team and get to know those guys on the field. On the varsity team at collegiate and stand behind the goal. I don't know if they even still have ball boys these days. It doesn't seem like it, but those were like some of my best memories, just standing back there with the collegiate helmet on those old back rack helmets. And you know, just watching and being enamored by the level of talent. And I just love the game right from the start. So and then I was lucky one of my best friends, Andrew O'Shea, his dad, Tim O'Shea. Started Geronimo lacrosse right when you were in first grade. And so I remember. My parents, opening that letter because at the time there was no rec, you know, there was no rec sports. There was no ability to really play lacrosse besides just with your friends in the backyard. And it was basically, this new rec league is, is coming to Richmond and you got to show up with your friends and I went all the way through that program and it's doing amazing things today. So all of that kind of collided, I guess, when I was really young to develop my love of the game. That's great. Awesome background. Excellent. And then, as we mentioned, in high school you're a multi sport athlete and as we mentioned, had played with Russell Wilson and that's just a extremely high caliber athlete, needless to say. So what was it like having that experience, being around someone like that who obviously made it to the biggest stage in one of the biggest sports in the world? And what are some of your favorite memories with, him and your teammates and any stories surrounding that? Yeah well, we had a lot of great athletes, within two or three years at collegiate growing up. And one of the reasons why I think it's just the environment we were put in. We were like that group of friends that just. Played every single sport as much as possible. We'd always go over to our friend Zach Mendez's house and it was kind of one of those houses where like anything goes. So we could really like play physical and push the push the limits a little bit. And it didn't matter what sport it was, but it was just like this breeding ground of competition and trying out all these different sports. And so as we kind of went along, we all developed and we always knew what each other was about to do. And we just had this great chemistry, you know, whether it was on the lacrosse field or the football field or even playing basketball. But Russell was really a part of that group. And he was a multi sport athlete as well. He's a great baseball player is a great basketball player. And then ultimately, football and baseball is what he pursued. But yeah, it was special years. You know, we won two straight state championships in football and then lacrosse. We lost in the state championship. Game my junior year, and then we ended up winning it my senior year. So we had a lot of success over those years and like I said, I think it just stemmed from those, that nonstop competition from a very young age getting to know each other really well. And we really cared about sports too. We Mm-Hmm, we, you know, we went the extra mile. We put in a lot of work in the weight room when we weren't in season and we were just a group that wanted to win. And it made for a really special high school experience. That's great. Awesome. Yeah, one of the things we like to talk a lot about too on the podcast is just Mindset, we kind of look at skills Mindset lacks IQ is helping kids like develop kind of the best picture of the game and I would say, as As they're getting older, it seems like they have the skill a lot of times. They might even have the athletic ability. But if they don't have the right kind of mindset and those intangibles, it can get in the way of success. And just curious, could you see that Russell Wilson had incredible intangibles? I mean, naturally, he's a great athlete. He probably understood sports well, but did he have tremendous intangibles and mindset? Yeah, and I would say that's the thing that separated him from the pack. I mean, his, the thing that he says all the time is the separation is in the preparation. And, it wasn't like this. Greek athlete that just right off the bat blew you away, but he just kept getting better and better and better every single year. And that continued when he got to college and it continued when he got to the pros, because, there's not a guy that's as mentally tough as Russell Wilson. And the funny thing is when you know him. You see the media's perception of him sometimes and people that don't really know who he is, that he can, you know, he can come off as, you know, corny or whatever you want to say about him, but that's, that's who he is. And he's authentic to himself. And he truly believes in the way that he talks to himself. The way he talks to the media is the way that he talks to himself. And he's very disciplined about. The types of thoughts that enter his mind and the types of thoughts that he will, give his attention to. And so and so mindset, he's a phenomenal athlete, obviously. And he's an extremely hard worker. He's committed. He's put in as much work as anybody, but I would, I would say that his, his mindset is what has separated him.

Jay: 11:34

How about if we transition to. J m l and let's do that. We'll get into a little bit of the mindset. We'll do a mindset minute here.

11:44

We're so glad you're joining us for season two of our podcast. Get the lax scoop. Due to popular demand. We have put together a brand new offering. It is a free ebook. Based on 10 of our season, one episodes in which experts such as bill Tierney, Lars, Tiffany, and Dom star Xia among others. Along with skills trainers and college lacrosse recruiting specialists such. As Syracuse. Great. Four time. All American Rick Beardsley and PLL championship coach Andy towers share their do's and don'ts of college lacrosse recruiting. The free version can be accessed by simply registering with the Jim McMahon lacrosse app. The link is listed in the description. For those who want a book in their hands, it is available on amazon.com. And the title of the book is inside the recruiting game insights from the experts. As we've mentioned earlier and also due to popular demand. We've put together a patron page for the show. This will allow those interested in supporting our efforts to do just that and to get exclusive access to unedited interviews, big discounts on JML online courses and merchandise for our new online store. There have been some big additions to the JML course catalog. Now we have a defenseman's course taught by none other than UVA head coach, Lars, Tiffany. And the goalie course taught by former two-time all American and UVA assistant coach kept earner. You can check out our Patrion page with the link that is listed in the description. As well as taking a look at the online store again, with the link listed in the description. You can check out these updates to the course catalog. With the free version of the J McMahon lacrosse app. Simply would register following the link that is listed in the description. For our mindset minute, we've got a message from none other than Dr. Rob Gilbert. He says, this is a message that can change all of our lives and it starts off with a riddle. Figure out who this is. I am your constant companion. I am your greatest helper or your heaviest burden. I will push you onward or drag you down to failure. I'm completely at your command half of the things that you do, you might just as well turn over to me. And I will be able to do them quickly and correctly. I am easily managed. You must merely be firm with me. Show me exactly how you want something done. And after a few lessons, I will do it automatically. I am the servant of all great people. And of all failures as well. Those who are great. I made great. Those who are failures? I made failures. I am not a machine though. I work with all the precision of one. Plus the intelligence of a genius. You may run me for profit or run me for ruin. It makes no difference to me. Take me train me, be firm with me and I will put the world at your feet. Be easy with me and I will destroy you. Who am I. I started out as a thin thread. And I end up as a strong cable. Who am I. I am habit. Now that you know who it is. Let's run through this lesson again. I am habit. I am your constant companion. I am your greatest helper or your heaviest burden. I will push you onward or drag you down to failure. I am completely at your command. Half the things you do, you might just as well turn over to me. And I will be able to do them quickly. And correctly. I am easily managed. You must merely be firm with me. Show me exactly how you want something done. And after a few lessons. I will do it automatically. I am a servant of all great people and of all failures as well. Those who are great. I've made great. Those who are failures? I've made failures. I'm not a machine though. I work with all the precision of one. Plus the intelligence of a person. You may run me for profit. Or run me for ruin. It makes no difference to me. Take me train me, be firm with me and I will put the world at your feet. Be easy with me and I will destroy you. I am habit. Dr. Rob Gilbert recommends that we think of one habit. That we want to start with and start it as soon as this message ends. Or maybe as soon as this podcast ends. And this will be that life changing message. Just think of one habit. You want to start a health habit, a work habit. Of workout habit. Uh, nutrition or diet habit say to yourself, I'll do this just for today. And that's how we start. And then tomorrow, same thing just for today. Let's say walk 10,000 steps. And tomorrow. The same thing just for today. We'll start out as a thin thread, a thin delicate thread. And end up as a strong, strong cable. Do we want to change our lives? It's all about habits. So there you go. That's our mindset minute. Hope you get out there and give it a shot. Now we will return to our program as coach Thompson continues to describe his experience growing up with NFL. Great. Russell Wilson. And he's worked with a lot of great guys. Like Trevor Mollad was his sports psych over the years. You know, if you're looking for any good books, look up his books, and there'll be no surprise as to kind of what Russell grew up learning in that, in that regard. Yeah, we could probably list that, definitely list that in the description. Trevor Moab, you said? Yeah, he's got, he's got a good book that's called It Takes What It Takes, I believe. And then he came out with, he came out with one other one recently, but they're both really good. I would butcher the spelling, but I think it would be M O A B. D. D. Trevor Milad. Okay. Cool. Awesome. Great. So Mikey, I didn't know Jay was so infatuated with Russell Wilson. I'd like to actually bring the interview back to you as our guests. I did meet him once and he really liked me. Apparently Jay. Yes, clearly. So Mikey, you know, you mentioned you have this family. Tradition that UVA, you're growing up in Richmond. So you're going to those UVA games. But as you say, you know, it's kind of incredible when you think about where the game is today, that like rec lacrosse is just starting when you're a young kid. Like there weren't a lot of opportunities. So what was your recruiting process like, and how much did the game grow? To allow you the opportunity to go to a place like UVA and play in college. What was that progression? Was it always Virginia for you? You know, walk us through that a little bit. Yeah. Well, to start, with your last question, when I was getting some interest from other schools Virginia was always the school that I wanted to go to and the school that I wanted to play for. I didn't know if I would ever get that opportunity, but I knew that that was a goal of mine. And you know, I did play obviously multiple, multiple sports in high school and I really didn't even play club lacrosse, you know, which is crazy to think about. I remember going to two different showcases, I think after my sophomore year, and that's where I got some of my attention within recruiting. But I also remember when I was a freshman, Bud Petit was a senior goalie and he was, he was headed off to Virginia and I remember seeing the Virginia staff on the sidelines at a couple of our high school games in the Charlottesville area. And I remember, playing pretty well in those games as a freshman. So maybe that was how I got on coach stars is a radar. But You know, it wasn't a hotbed. And I think, back then it was basically, if you came from Virginia and made it onto the Virginia lacrosse roster, you were probably going to end up playing defense or defensive middie, or, not necessarily like one of the skill positions. And so it's kind of funny cause I was a midfielder, my whole career growing up. My senior year of high school, I played attack cause I had a knee injury. And I, scored six goals in our, State championship game. And within a week, I remember being on the phone with my head high school coach, Andrew Stanley, and he had just talked to coach stars yet, and it was already being talked about that. I was going to play D midi. And at the time I was kind of like, come on, man, I just scored six goals. Like I got to do play. I could play offense, but ultimately I, I really didn't care. And I think that at heart I'm more, I was more of an athlete than a lacrosse player. And I think that that translated well into the type of player that I, I became for Virginia. Right. And Dom loves athletes, no doubt. That's for sure. I don't know how he recruited Jay, but Come on around, you know so, so Mike, you say like, you don't, you're not, you don't play club lacrosse. You're a multi sport athlete. And then as they say, come on to the grounds at UVA and you're coming into a team that's been on an incredible run, right? National championships in 99 Oh three and Oh six, they're making final four after final four. What's it like for you coming into that environment? on the one hand, you said, you know, athletics was always important. You're playing in a competitive environment, but maybe you hadn't played that high level of high school lacrosse and now boom, you're on a team that's competing for national championships every year. What's, what's that transition like? Yeah, well, I think that's a transition that's hard for everybody. Even if you're being recruited to come to CNU, you go from being one of the best players on your high school and club team to all of a sudden now being, with 50 other guys that are in the same position, but they've been in a college weight room for sometimes four years. Years. Mm-Hmm. And so that's a, that's a really hard adjustment. And I think as a freshman, first of all, there's, you have to come in with lots of humility and understand that no matter where you're at on the depth chart, there's gonna be a lot of work and a lot of learning of team culture and style of play and, and all that stuff that it's gonna, it's gonna require some time. So that's where it started for me, was. You know, just coming in humble and understanding that I was going to have to outwork a lot of guys and, you know, there were still guys on the team. I'll never forget, you know on my visit being with Danny Gladding and he was only one year ahead of me, but he was coming off of this year where he was. You know, a starting ex attackman as a freshman on UVA's 2006 National Championship team. And so, it was just feeling like honored to be a part of something so much bigger than myself and something that I'd grown up loving. That really pushed me to just want to put my best foot forward and to do the work every day that would hopefully end up pushing me towards a place where I could contribute on the field as well. So that atmosphere got your attention every day at practice, didn't have to fire yourself up. Yeah, absolutely. Mikey, how about leadership? I mean, obviously, Jay went through some of your accolades as a coach. And so you've clearly developed into a tremendous leader of young men. But you also grew into somebody who was. A tri captain of the 2010 team at UVA. So, you talk about that journey of coming in humble to this incredibly talented team and, and feeling like you got to earn your way up the depth chart thinking about. When you felt you were a leader of the team or how did you think about leadership then? And, and how has that translated to how you think about leadership with your players today? Yeah, that's, that's a great question. I don't think it ever really changed. I think that the only thing that changes when you get a C on your chest or you're in a position of leadership is you just understand there's more responsibility. And there's those, there's hard times when you really have to stick your neck out and step up for what you think is best for the team. And so early in your career, you can kind of quietly go about your business and do the things that are going to be best for you. And maybe like a couple of your classmates around you, but when you get to be a junior, a senior, and you become a captain or you become a coach, you realize that you have to continue doing what you've been doing, but you also have to look out for. more people that are around you. And sometimes that means tough conversations. Sometimes that means doing a little bit of extra work or just doing anything you possibly can to make everything go, even if it's not going to result in any personal glory. And that's kind of the mentality I've taken into into the coaching world as well, especially as a division three head coach. As I'm sure some of your other guests would tell you, do a little bit of everything and there's no, There's no task that's too, there's no task that's beneath you as a Division three head coach. And you just have to roll up your sleeves and be willing to do anything and everything you can to make things go day to day. It's awesome. Now, I know just looking at the background that you experienced some real tragedies there while you were at UVA and naturally we don't need to get into all the details about it, but I was lucky enough to come across a talk that you had given to your high school alma mater, like seven or eight years after the fact it was online. And you spoke to the young people that day about how challenging life can be at times. And. We have a lot of parents and young people who listen to this program and we're always kind of talking about overcoming adversity and after reading that speech I thought it would be just a great example if you could just run through I'm sure you're have a good idea of the things you had gone through don't necessarily need to remember the whole speech but just a few of those points that were just terrific of overcoming adversity I think that would be great for the listeners out there. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I think, the speech kind of the theme of the speech was a quote from Victor Frankl's book, Man's Search for Meaning. It's a phenomenal book if you hadn't read it. Yeah, I haven't read that. He was a Holocaust survivor. And talked, talked about finding purpose in your life. And the quote that really resonated with me was he talks about the last of human freedoms and how there's a space between stimulus and response. So whatever happens to you, if you have. the wherewithal and, you know if you have the ability to take a deep breath in some cases, but also just to take some space to realize, Hey, I have the ability to choose how I'm going to respond to this. That's really the last of human freedoms. It's something that no one can ever take away from you, no matter what the situation is. So that ability to choose how we respond to any adversity was really what I based my speech off of. And, I went back and went, went through my journey in high school and some of the stuff that you just mentioned, you know, state championships and getting to the chance to go to play at UVA and then. boom, right there. It starts with, 2006 was an undefeated season. And then my first game as a freshman was a loss to Drexel who was, who was,, unranked at the time. So it was like right away, you know, it's not, it's not just going to be all wins and fun here, you know, stuff's going to happen. And that was,, then we lost one of our good friends, Will Barrow who died of suicide. And, we had the yard, we loved strategy tragedy and. I lost two of my my young cousins during the time. And there was just a lot of this, a lot of stuff that was unfortunate. You wouldn't want to go through one of these things in a lifetime, but it kind of just kept piling on. And and what I did was I kind of went back through each of those tragedies, relive them a little bit. And then and then just was able to detail kind of what came of those tragedies. So you would never want any of this stuff to happen, but, we'll use the one love, the one love foundation of, is an example. I mean, how much more awareness has been raised to relationship violence since one love was founded. And and you know, the, the examples are endless, but that was, that was really the theme of of that speech. And I think, I think that, As a coach, what I want my guys to realize is that like hard times are coming. It's not, it's not if, but when, and if you understand that you do have that, that space between stimulus and response, and you realize that that is our, as a human, our greatest superpower you're still going to make mistakes and choose unwise responses plenty of times. But I just think that that's a good lesson for all of us. Absolutely. That's awesome. Yeah, I happen to have read that book as well and definitely going to put that in the description. Good, great stuff. Now, you know, after playing in three national semifinals for UVA, sophomore to senior years, I think it was, you stay on as an undergrad assistant in 2011, and you help that team who was nine and five in the regular season, and then they do make it into the playoffs. And I remember looking at the list, that first game, you know, you're They managed to, you guys managed to beat Bucknell in overtime and then just go on an incredible run of three more games, beating Maryland in the national championship game. And so that's a heck of a way to kick off a coaching career for sure. And so if you could tell us a little bit about that experience and, I mean, that just must've been incredible. Cause I remember watching that team very closely because it was one of the teams that wasn't ranked number one the whole year through and had a lot of ups and downs and would love to hear about that. Yeah. Yeah. Man, things were not going well that year. Not going well. Well, that's an understatement. For a team that lost five of its last six games. And limp their way in to the NCA tournament. Listen to the next week to see how the 2011 UVA lacrosse team becomes a national champion.

Ron: 29:07

until we meet again, here to, hoping you find the twine. We're signing off here at the Get the LAX coop. Thanks again so much. We will see you the next time.