The Legend of Danny Lee
Or: Who hears the goalie whisperer?
You might think that my greatest accomplishment is helping a team win a state title. Or winning assistant coach of the year. Or winning said title with a first-year goalie who was a baseball player for a decade. Or, slipping that trio of facts into the start of a story to humble-brag so hard that your eyes roll into the back of your skull.
However, you’d be wrong.
The greatest accomplishment of my entire coaching career is turning a player with zero experience into a varsity goalie who led us to the state semi-finals in 2021.
His name was Danny Lee, and I only coached him for one season, but his development is the thing that I’m the most proud of as a lacrosse coach.
My first season at Hopkinton was a constant and consistent learning curve. I had no idea how to work with the head coach, when I could jump into huddles, or where I belonged in general. My first game was a bit of a disaster, as we played the same team where my high school career ended, and I hadn’t been there since. I was having trouble regulating my emotions. The kids felt that, and we were down early to a team we should have been (respectfully) beating the tar out of. That game set the tone for the rest of my time as a Hawk. Positive control of the things that can be controlled. Adaptation and/or adjustment to things we can’t. This isn’t the game that changed our season, but it changed me. If it never happened, I would still be coaching the way I did in that game - projecting my emotions and (inadvertently) trauma-dumping my ego onto every kid.
Our goalie in that game helped us get back into the game. He was a 6’ 5’’ behemoth who ate bad shots alive and machined them into clinical fast breaks. But this story isn’t about him - it’s about his backup, who was a first year player trying out the game as a freshman.
You see, a few games later, that starting goalie broke his leg trying to dunk in flip flops on an outdoor basketball hoop. Ill-advised in any scenario. It left us with one option.
Danny Lee.
Danny was a freshman who had been convinced to try out for the team with a combination of coersion and curiosity. Unlike most new goalies, he wasn’t afraid of the ball; he just didn’t understand why he was unable to stop it from hitting his body. He was the JV goalie, so he did a lot of warming up and not much else. We never thought he was going to play a Varsity game.
Now he had to.
Danny’s first JV start, and first ever lacrosse game, came against a Division One team. I think everyone expected us to completely fold against this team. Then, when we got to the field, they rolled out a bench that looked like the runout for a D-1 football team. I didn’t see everyone’s eyes go wide, I felt them - because mine were doing the same thing. "Why are there so many of them? How are they this big?”
But here’s the great thing about lacrosse - just being big and fast doesn’t win you games. You have to know how to catch and throw. You have to know how to play. We only had 16 kids, but those 16 kids knew how to do both of those things slightly better. We won the game 3-2. I ran to Danny, grabbed him, and lifted him into the air before I headbutted him (he had a helmet on, I didn’t; I was just excited) and screamed in his face, “I told you, you could do it! I told you!” He smiled a shy smile. The kids started chanting his name. We shook hands, and we went home with hope.
Coincidentally, the starter broke his leg a few days later.
Danny’s Varsity debut came against Division Two team that was known for knocking people around. We had a meeting with the offense and the upperclassmen to tell them that we needed to protect Danny at all costs. And that the most likely scenario was that we would have to outscore everyone we played for the rest of the year to have a chance at getting through the playoffs.
And, man, this team played that game like they were set on fire with bottle rockets strapped to their body. They dove to the end line to back up shots. They rode like demons. They took more shots in one half than we had in the last three games put together. It was incredible. We won the game 17-9.
Danny had 4 saves.
We won the next few games playing a similar style, but against lesser opponents in our division, so we were able to control the ball much better. The other team can’t score if you have the ball. The best defense is really a boot-to-the-neck-style offense. Don’t let anyone tell you different.
But Danny wasn’t happy. One day, he asked to take a break from all the shots he was facing. He walked away from the sideline and ambled over by the treeline on the endline of our field. I thought he was going to sit in the shade since it was so hot, but he just plopped down on the grass, took off his helmet, and picked at some stray weeds.
I remember thinking, “Oh, no. This is it. He’s done.” I walked over to him and sat down next to him.
“What’s going on?” I asked.
“…” (Danny was a man of few words).
“Hey, I know it’s tough. Being a goalie is really hard, and - “
“I’m not good at it.” He said flatly.
“Danny. No one is good at something the first few weeks of doing it. It takes time. Honestly, you’re so much better.”
Unimpressed, Danny stared back at me with eyes far more serious than a 14 year old should know how to express, and said, “I’m not good.”
I sat there with him in that long uncomfortable silence. Picked a few blades of grass. Leaned back and thought about what I could say that might make him feel better.
“Well…why don’t you tell me when you’re ready to take some more shots so we can fix that? Because I love shooting on you, dude. It’s my favorite part of the day.” I got up, tapped him on the helmet, and walked back to the front of the net to gather all the balls up. Danny got back in the net. He kept getting back in the net for the next few weeks. Every practice, he got a little better. The team kept scoring, so we kept winning.
The night before our first playoff game, he sent the head coach and I an email that said, “What do you think the other team’s scouting report on me is going to be? Can you tell me what you think it would be? Please, be honest.”
We laughed. Then he asked us about it in warm ups. We told him that it didn’t matter. He was our goalie, and we were going to win with him. And we did. Danny had 11 saves.
As we prepped for the quarterfinals, Danny’s confidence vacillated. In practice, he was scored on frequently in live drills and six-on-six. It ate at him. But we needed to have that scoring confidence to win. So, we couldn’t really pull back the reigns. He asked for extra shots after practice. I stayed a few times to help, but he was sick of me shooting on him. He wanted to stop his teammates’ shots. One of them asked me if they should shoot “for real” or if they should ease up on him. I just said, “Don’t hurt our goalie,” and walked off.
We won our quarterfinal game with even more ease than the previous round, due in most part to the opposing team’s inability to clear. Danny had a handful of saves. But now we were in the semi-finals. This was real.
We lost the semi-finals to the eventual champion that year 7-12. On the sideline, the injured goalie, on crutches with half of his leg surrounded by a cylinder of metal with pins sticking into his legs, came up to me and apologized for being hurt. I said something that I’ve often repeated since, “Did we deserve to win the game?”
“Well, no, but - “
“Then we didn’t win the game. We don’t get to be upset. If we deserved to win and we lost, then, yeah- we get to be mad. But we didn’t, so we have to accept it.”
Sidebar: If you know me at all, you know that this is the most level-headed thing that has ever come out of my hyperbolicly wired mouth.
After the game, Danny sent the coach and me another email.
He blamed himself. He apologized multiple times. He said that it was all his fault.
We each crafted a similar response. That it wasn’t his fault. That we win and lose as a team and that we were proud of him for stepping up and that we appreciated how dedicated he was to getting better.
He thanked us for that and told us that things weren’t like that where he grew up. He wasn’t used to being on a team. He wasn’t used to being praised; he was just disciplined for not being good enough. He thanked us for not doing that. We named him the team’s most improved player that season.
Oh, I almost forgot - I buried the lede to this entire story.
On the first day of practice, I asked each new player what other sports they had played in an effort to find any connective athletic tissue to work with. Danny was the last kid I asked. He said, “Uhm, I was on the chess team.”
I thought he was joking. So, I pressed him a little bit more. “No, I mean what other sports have you ever played, like even as a little kid.”
“I - I never played sports,” said Danny.
Now, he’s always going to be my favorite lacrosse goalie.