S2 E14. Mikey Likes It! 2X DIII National Semi-Finalist, CNU HC, Mikey Thompson, Part II

In this episode of 'Get the Lax Scoop,' hosts Big Dawg and Jaybird, alongside special guest Christopher Newport University head coach Mikey Thompson, delve into the world of lacrosse. Thompson shares his experiences from his collegiate playing days at the University of Virginia to his coaching career, including admirable leadership lessons from his mentor, Coach Dom Starsia. 

The conversation also covers recruiting strategies, the evolution of public school lacrosse in Virginia, specifically as a reflection of our entire country as a whole with the emphasis on individual as well as team skill development. 

Additionally, there are insights into preparing for college-level lacrosse, navigating recruitment, and optimizing player potential. Sponsored by Jay McMahon Lacrosse, the episode combines personal anecdotes, professional wisdom, and practical advice for aspiring players.

00:00 Welcome to Lax Scoop: The Ultimate Lacrosse Podcast

00:23 Meet the Hosts

00:42 Special Guest Spotlight

01:02 Diving Deep with Coach Mikey Thompson

04:24 Coaching Insights and Philosophy with Mikey Thompson

06:27 The Path to Coaching: Mikey Thompson's Story

10:08 Exploring the Evolution of Lacrosse Recruitment

16:49 Recruiting Philosophy and Finding the Right Fit

24:08 The Importance of Individual Skill Development

25:33 Signing Off with a Tease for Next Week

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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

Hello everyone. And welcome back to the show. We're excited to bring you the second installment of our interview series with Christopher Newport university head coach Mikey Thompson. If you missed part one. We highly recommend you go back and check it out. As coach T described, growing up with his neighborhood friend and eventual high school football teammate, NFL. Great Russell Wilson. As well as detailing his experiences, playing for the university of Virginia and becoming a tri captain in 2010. The 2010 team was the regular season and NCA tournament. Number one ranked team in the nation. For this interview, we'll pick up right where we left off, where coach Thompson is describing his first year as an assistant coach at the university of Virginia in 2011. 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. Right, right. You know, we were, we were just, we were just really trying to hang on, you know, the, the Old Navy Seal saying just make it to the next meal was kind of where we were at you know, it was like every day was a bit of a roller coaster. We had phenomenal leadership, obviously from the top with our coaching staff and we had some really good captains that year as well. But we surely had to earn everything and. What ultimately happened was just guys really understanding what made that team special and how we could win. And guys maximizing the roles that they played in down the stretch. You know, having steel Stanwick be the quarterback of the offense, you know, we ran a good amount of big, little behind the, behind the goal, just to kind of keep the ball on his stick as much as possible. And, and let him run the offense. We, we switched to running primarily zone defense. And yeah, I mean, I think that was really. The main thing was just understanding, like, what our strengths were and, and really highlighting those strengths, and and having a clear identity of what it would take for that team to win. And and everybody just kind of pulling together against all odds. It doesn't always happen like that, but when it does, it's, it's pretty special to be a part of. And that was, you know, really, really good way to start my coaching career. I didn't do too much that year. I'm not going to act like I was like, had that much to do with coaching. Cause I was still, you know, I was still almost like one of the guys at that point, but but it was very different from previous years because the previous years we were going into the tournament ranked, you know, number one or number two and that team, it just seemed like we were going to lose early, but that's, that's sports, you know, like people always say that, but. Man, when that happens, it's pretty special. Right. Absolutely. Hey, Mikey, what, you know, one of the things the three of us share is our relationship and respect for, for Coach Starsia, for Dom. And, you know, I'm wondering as you Look back now, you know, when you're out there on the field, what are the things that you really took from that experience playing for Dom that have stayed with you and that have defined some of the ways you approach You know, the way you coach and lead. I would say, first of all, it's just authenticity. Like how important it is as a coach to be, to just be yourself. And you know, college kids are really observant and I think they can, they can sniff out often inauthenticity pretty quickly. And I just feel like Dom was always himself and, you know, he'd never shied away from that. And he was incredibly consistent. In the way he went about his business and you know, he, he held guys to a high standard, but it never felt like it was a job, you know, we've always had a lot of fun out on the field and he always wanted the relationships to be the most important part of the whole thing. And And I also really always, we, you know, I'm sure with you guys, it's the same way, but, you know, we have, have a alumni thread and it's just funny to see how many of his sayings and mantras have just continued great day in America, you know or, you know, and, and I find myself saying them all the time on the practice field, but I've realized as a coach, like, Kids can only process so many things. So if you have a really clear idea of like what your most important things are, whether you're, whether their core values or mantras or sayings. You know, if you just repeat those things over and over, your guys are going to remember them. And that's going to kind of transform the way that you, the way that you play on game day and the way that you act off the field. So those are just a few things that I've, I've taken I've taken with me from coach and we've stayed, stayed very close and he's been one of my, my biggest mentors you know, as I've, as I've gone through the the college coaching profession. Dom's got a hell of a coaching tree, you know so Mikey, how about your, so, you know, Jay talks about that great year at Virginia where you're an assistant coach for the first time, then you're, you're named assistant at, at CNU. Had you decided to be a coach? You know, did you always want to be a coach or what was that sort of transition like for you or decision to make this your profession? Yeah you know, I, well, I started off I started off at UVA in the Curry school of education. So I knew that I wanted to do something in coaching or teaching. My dad, like my dad, as I was telling telling Jay before before we got on here, my dad was the upper school counselor. At collegiate, and he also was the head head lacrosse coach at collegiate for a long time until I was about four years old and he won, won a bunch of state championships. So, coaching and mentoring and counseling were kind of what I was brought up in. And my, my dad is 100 percent my, you know, my hero, you know, I, the amount of conversations I've had over the years with my dad, I was able to, I mean, just been able to bounce anything off of him. And so I loved how many people is a young kid. I had all these parents that I didn't even know would come up to me when I was really young and impressionable. And they'd say, Hey, you have no idea how much your dad has helped my family or how much your dad has helped my marriage or my son. And I just have all these memories of people coming up to me and saying stuff like that. And I didn't know the ins and outs of what he did as a counselor, but. I just knew that I wanted to help people because that's what makes me feel, you know, feel the most purpose. And so you know, fast forward to when I'm in college and, you know, some of those tragedies that we all experienced together and having Guys like Dom and Mark Van Arsdale and coach Walker, like those guys lead us through those tragedies made such a huge impression on me that I realized, like maybe being a college coach would give me the ability to actually really make a difference in some young people's lives. And so that was kind of the thing that led me to getting into college coaching. I had a few more credits to finish up. Dom offered me the. The chance to coach on that last year. And then my younger brother had actually just committed to play lacrosse at CNU while I was coaching at Virginia. And there was a full time assistant position open at CNU. And so the combination of all those things and also. You know, quite frankly, the ability to like live at the beach right after college was I was like, let's not forget that, right? I was kind of like, if this sucks, then I'll live at the beach and I'll do something else. Here I am over 10 years later doing the same thing. So it turned out to be a good decision. But but that was kind of, that was kind of what led me into coaching. And I, I've realized over time that What I thought then was absolutely true and it's a really hard job and it it takes a lot out of me, but I love the sport so much and I love the, the ability to hopefully make an impact and and you know, couldn't be happier doing what I'm doing. That's great. Awesome stuff. Our other Pal just got here. He does a few like funny questions at the end. His parents like had their anniversary. I guess he forgot because he told me he'd be here on time, which is fine, but he just popped in. He might just say hello for a minute and then he'll come on at the end with a couple of these funny questions, but sounds great. So anyway, let's we'll move on. I can edit all that out pretty easily. Just what we went over there, but I'll go on with our next question there. So looking at your roster, Mikey at CNU, we can see that you recruit players from all around the country, including the state of Virginia. And please tell us how the lacrosse landscape has changed since you graduated high school back in 2006 and even since you started coaching in college in 2011. And using the state of Virginia as an example just because I look at your roster, I recognize a lot of the teams on there from the Richmond area, for example. Were there any public schools playing lacrosse? Back in 2006, 2011. And have you seen the same kind of is that reflect across other states like North Carolina, South Carolina? You know, there's this growth because at this point, there's a lot of public schools playing and you've got a lot of them on your roster, right? Yeah, when I was when I was in high school, I remembered that the Richmond shock was basically like the club team of all the public schools that were playing. Mhm. Derek, I coached with them a little bit. That's funny. Yeah, and they had some really good players and and over time, you know, more and more public schools in Richmond and obviously in Northern Virginia. There's so many, so many schools up there. There's so much growth in the DMV area. But over time, these these these public school kids started picking it up, and there's a lot of great athletes, obviously, in the state of Virginia and and so those teams got, you know, got some good coaches and they kept getting better and better. And we realized being a state school at seeing you that that was going to be a really important you know, Area for us to target is the, is the public schools in Virginia. And so, yeah, we have about 50 percent of our, our roster is made up of Virginia kids. And the other 50 percent is pretty much from all over. We've got, you know, Colorado, Florida, North Carolina, you know, Michigan really, really all over the place from there. Yeah. But but definitely a lot of growth, both in the state of Virginia. I'm really excited that just two years ago, the public schools in the Virginia Beach Hampton Roads area are now playing as well. That was a long time coming. But if you look at the high school football area the high school football in our area, it's, it's phenomenal. There's a lot of great athletes here and. I'm trying to do as much as I can in the Virginia Beach you know, Peninsula Hampton Roads area to continue to grow the sport because because there's lots of good athletes here. And once you start, you can't stop as we all know. Right, right. Now, Mikey, let's follow up on these areas around the country that you are Recruiting players. Cause I know Rhode Island has to be a huge hotbed for you. I work at Moses Brown and, and so I want to make sure we got a shout out. My God, Jude McClain down there, you know, it's going to start a pipeline for you. All right. Absolutely. Jude, Jude had his first career hat trick this weekend. So so shout out Moses Brown. Love it. Love it. Hey and you won all four of those games. I saw you were telling us you wanted to do the podcast this week, cause you had four in a row. I think you won all four, right? Yeah, we went Saturday in New Jersey Wednesday in Fredericksburg and then two games back to back Saturday, Sunday. So that's, that's D three lacrosse right there. We love to play games. That's awesome. Hey Mikey, speaking of D3 lacrosse, you know, it's been fun for Jay and I we've got a bunch of great D3 coaches on over the last year. Just talked to coach Koudelka at Lynchburg and, and, you know my brother coaches at RPI and we had his mentor, Dave Webster on from Dickinson. And one of the things that really stuck with Jay and I, and we mentioned to coach Koudelka is how. Surprise Davis sometimes when he's recruiting kids that have maybe grown up, you know, playing club and thinking division one that have never actually seen a division three game. You know, and so I'm just wondering with that context you know, you've again played and coached at the highest level, but with more and more kids playing, I'm just so impressed whenever I watch a division three game with the quality of the just the talent. The, the quality of the competition. So you, can you talk, can you put that into perspective for folks who maybe, you don't, don't get to watch CNU and some of these great division three games and how, you know, coming from Virginia, you would, you would, I don't know, I'll kind of care. Compare or put the game in context for folks. Yeah, well, you know, way back to that first question about, you know, growing up one of the things me and a couple of my buddies used to always do was drive up for championship weekend, you know, whether it was the New Jersey or Baltimore, Philly. We would always make the effort to hop in a car. One of the dads would drive us up there. We'd be like studying for finals in the car. But those memories are, are like ingrained in my head. You know, 45, 000 people. I hope that. I hope that we can keep growing that crowd back because, you know, with TV and all that, sometimes I feel like it's getting smaller, but man, those are like the best memories for our sport ever. But, but anyway, I remember one Sunday going to check out the D three game and I had no idea who any of the teams were, but My, my memory could be wrong, but it felt like it was like on a grass field, like around the corner or something like that. And I, I, I really was so young, I can't remember, but I swear it must have been like around the corner on a grass field and I was just like blown away by how good everybody was. And that was a long time ago. And now I think with the growth of the game and how. How many kids are playing? You know, I think most Division three coaches, that are, in the top 20 are going to tell you that they're recruiting a lot of the same kids that are being recruited to play division one lacrosse. And there's, you know, there's, there's benefits to both. But when you start looking at that small number of scholarships that spread across all those, All those kids and there's not big NIL money yet in lacrosse. So sometimes, you know, a school like CNU, that's a state school, you know, we, you might end up going to a great school with a great program that's, that's less expensive than, some of the, the middle, middle of the pack or low end division one schools, you might be closer to home and, you know, you might win more games too. So there's, There's a lot that might attract you to play at a high level division three school or whatever division three school makes the most sense for you based on what you're looking for. And and when you're recruiting the same caliber of player and, you know, you, you put them in a great culture with great coaches, you're going to get, you're going to get some really high level games. And and, you know, sometimes there might be four of those games a week, like I said. Yeah. That's amazing. So. Mikey, you just touched on recruiting and, you know, it's always interesting for us to ask. different coaches who maybe have some different philosophies, approaches, or systems like, all right, when you're going out to all these events, or you're looking at a piece of film, what are the, maybe the two or three distinguishing characteristics that you're really looking at that for you separate a kid? Whether these are, you know, lacrosse skills or, or some of those intangibles or mindset kind of pieces that Jay was talking about. It's hard to narrow it down to, you know, two or three. I think that there's there's some boxes that we have to check off before we offer out any spots. And you know, first of all, someone that's going to jump off the page when you're watching them live, you know, whether that's athleticism or skill or, Or iq. And then there's gonna be talking to their high school and club coaches to see what type of kid they are, what type of work ethic they have. Are they a great teammate? Then there's gonna be film. And film is, man, if you're playing as much lacrosse as kids these days and you're having every single. Game you play filmed by like three different camera angles If your highlight tape isn't like really really good these days, then you're probably not very good I mean Back when back when we used to play you might be lucky to have like one, you know blurry highlight, but nowadays So it's, everything's filmed and you got to have a really good film and that's that's what's going to kind of give you an idea of what this kid could be at their best. So the film is definitely a big piece of it. Getting them and their family on campus is going to be a piece of it. But for me, I think if I had to answer your question. Just athletic potential, I think would trump all other things. Because some kids can be really good high school players, but they might be maxed out athletically. And I would rather take a chance, especially as a division three head coach. I would rather take a chance on a kid that could develop over their four years to be at the level of a middle or upper tier division one kid versus a kid that might be a little bit more maxed out athletically at the moment because those are the guys that are going to ultimately be you're all Americans is the one that have a baseline of I. Q. And work ethic and athleticism. But then when you're in a college weight room for the Four years and you're playing lots of pickup. You're competing every day in practice. You're watching film from every single drill of every single practice. Now you can develop into that type of player that could be an all American. So Jay got played for Dom. He wants athletes. Come on, right. Shock. Come on, getting up and down the field, baby. Let's go bang that ball around. All right. That's great.

Jay: 19:35

How about if we transition to. J m l and let's do that.

19:41

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. With summer lacrosse on the verge of getting started. We urge all our young listeners out there to go ahead and try the offensive defensive or goalie course based on your position that is free on the J McMahon lacrosse app. And when, and if you are ready, you can move on to the paid programming. They get started. You would either download the J McMahon lacrosse app from the apple app store or Google play simply typing in J a Y. M C M a H O N. And the word lacrosse. And there you'll find the app or simply register following the link that is listed in the show notes. We will return to our interview in progress. And then just a quick question. So on the film, like, when would you expect to see that from a player? You know, the sooner the better where our, our cycle is usually, we're about 25 percent done with our recruiting class, or we're, we're usually get about 25 percent of our recruits in the spring of their junior year, about 75 percent will commit in the summer going into senior year. And then we'll usually save a couple of spots for, you know, the later guys in the fall of their senior year. So if we, if we can see film you know, sophomore year. Going into, you know, fall of junior year. That's when we're really, we're really keyed in the most. And so they're reaching out to you with that first email along with the highlight tape, and then they're kind of on your radar or have you reached out to them already? You know, it's, it's really anything and everything these days. It's hard to give you a perfect answer. We, you know, all college coaches would tell you the amount of emails that we get these days is pretty insane. Right. And just because we don't, we try to get back to as many emails as we can, but especially when we're in our spring season we're just so busy. And so so don't be discouraged if college coaches don't get back to you right away. That doesn't mean that you're not on their radar. Prospect days are great. You know, we run prospect days, usually one in the winter and one in the summer. And those are great because you know, every kid there is genuinely interested in your program. And they're going to knock out a bunch of those boxes that I was talking about. You can check a lot of those boxes at a prospect day, but you know, be consistent, but not relentless. You know, we don't need to hear from you every week. And don't be. Discouraged if you haven't heard back yet. But but there's, there's no lack of ways to get in contact with coaches these days. And I think, you know, having a good highlight film having coaches that can be advocates, having your grades in there and maybe a quick sentence or two about why you're interested in that specific institution is always, always good things to, to have in that initial contact email. Good stuff. And then another topic that we'd like to discuss is the need for players to really come to work on their individual skills. And you know, we've seen just as youth coaches that so many of these boys and girls are out there playing game after game tournament after tournament and especially like in the middle school years. It seems like where they can just get left behind if they don't take some time outside of practice. To work on their game. And it was funny actually this weekend watching the Carolina or rather Virginia Syracuse game. Paul Gate was honored and they're like, Oh, what made you and Gary so great? And he talked about practicing outside of practice. So I was like, all right, good, good plug there from Paul Gate. But in general, we emphasize that and you know, working with the team. You know, certain skills, you know, even considering mindset lacks IQ, all that stuff. What are certain skills that you would recommend kids work on, especially as you said, you went through the Geronimo program. What are some things that you think these middle schoolers, you know, then they're, once they're in high school, they're going to be on that circuit where they're doing all this, all these big travel tournaments and doing the showcases. So what are some skills that you'd say, Hey, everyone out there has really got to work on, on this, you know, if there's two or three or four things, what do you think they might be? Yeah, well, I would start by saying, I think playing is kind of a relative term, Plain. A relative term. A relative of whom or a relative to what. Tune in next week to hear coach Thompson's theory of relativity and how it relates to playing the game of lacrosse.

Ron: 25:37

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.