October 27, 2014

Former Air Force men's lacrosse captain John Krzyminski (second from left in air) and Coronado(Calif.) High defenseman Paul Rodriguez (jumping out of plane in foreground) participate inPararescue training. (Courtesy of John Krzyminski)

This is an updated version of an article that appears in the November mmiilliittaarryy eeddiittiioonn of LacrosseMagazine. Don't get the mag? JJooiinn UUSS LLaaccrroossssee and its 430,000 members to start your subscriptiontoday.

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If ever there was a morning to sleep in and sleep it off in Charlottesville, it was the Tuesday afterMemorial Day 2011, a little more than 12 hours after the Virginia men's lacrosse team defeatedMaryland for its fth NCAA championship.

Most of Bray Malphrus' teammates were snoozing off the previous night of celebrating as the seniordefenseman and team captain swung his car into the parking lot of an Army recruiting ofce. He parked,walked around and opened the passenger door. There, buckled in by the seat belt, was the NCAAchampionship trophy.

"I was not letting go of that thing," Malphrus said.

Malphrus also still had a jet-black beard and ferocious Mohawk, as a startled ESPN audience discovered

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the previous evening during his interview on the eld. The combination had a similar effect on thesergeant on duty when Malphrus walked in.

"This guy was looking at me sideways like, 'What the hell are you?' I said, 'I am here because I want to bean Army Ranger.' He was like, 'OK, did you just get nished playing 'Call of Duty?'"

For much of his career at Virginia, when Malphrus wasn't practicing lacrosse, he was preparing to try outfor one of the military's elite, highly selective special operations jobs. Prior to his junior year, he almostleft Virginia to become a Navy SEAL. Instead, he decided to come back for a nal run at the NCAA title,changed his goal to making it into the Army's Special Forces, and decided that a hitch as a Ranger wouldbe the right rst step. By the time he walked into that ofce, he probably knew more about life as aRanger than most of the recruiters, who took turns taking pictures with the trophy as Malphrus lled outforms.

Though his grooming habits needed work, Malphrus' lacrosse background gave him a better thanaverage chance to survive the grueling selection processes modern special operations forces like theRangers and SEALs use to weed out wannabes.

Ranger school, the Army's elite infantry program, droppedabout 50 percent of candidates in 2011. (Malphrus passed in2012.) The SEALs' initial school, BUD/S, routinely washesout two of every three candidates. In the Air Force, trainingfor Pararescue and Combat Control, that branch's rescueand air control commandos, often graduates as few as one in10 volunteers.

But lacrosse players who volunteer tend to do better thanthose steep odds imply. As a result, if you spend much timearound America's most highly trained warriors, you'll likelymeet former players, from high school backups to Division IAll-Americans.

Rorke Denver, an All-American defenseman, played on twoSyracuse NCAA title teams before joining the SEALs in 1998.After several combat tours, he was assigned as a seniortraining ofcer at BUD/S in the late 2000s when the Navybegan looking at candidates' athletic backgrounds.

"For years we'd wondered, what is that secret sauce thatgets somebody through our training?" Denver said. "Weabsolutely, mathematically gured out that you have a betterchance not a dramatically better chance, but better ifyou play lacrosse, rugby, water polo, wrestling or [competein] triathlon. By the numbers, you have a better chance of making it through SEAL training."

Knowing it's true is one thing; knowing why is quite another. Former players who have gone on to specialops careers cite several factors, including the particular breed of tness that lacrosse demands a mixof full-body endurance and fast-twitch coordination, enough exibility to shake off hard hits and enoughmuscle to deliver them.

But as all special operations troops insist, the most difcult aspect of their training is mental. Denverthinks that's where lacrosse players have an edge.

"It's a focused effort of our recruiting arm to go to lacrosse events," said Denver, now a SEAL reservistand author of "Damn Few: Making the Modern SEAL Warrior," in which he extols lacrosse for preparinghim for military success. "You know how to set a goal, you're hyper competitive, you have that positiveinternal dialogue that lets you get through tough times."

A steady stream of Division I players have joined the SEALs especially since 9/11. Navy has a stronghistory of sending players to the SEALs, and perhaps most famously Brendan Looney, a captain onNavy's NCAA runner-up team in 2004. Looney was killed in action in Afghanistan in 2010.

Looney's roommate at the academy, Travis Manion, also was killed in action as a Marine in 2007. Manionplayed lacrosse in high school at La Salle outside Philadelphia, while the Looneys graduated fromDeMatha in Maryland. The two schools, both national powers, now meet annually in a match dubbed theFallen Heroes Game dedicated to Looney and Manion.

A similar spec-ops pipeline exists between lacrosse and the Army Rangers. Duke's Jimmy Regan waskilled in northern Iraq in 2007 when his vehicle was struck by an explosive device. His story inspiredBlue Devils defenseman Casey Carroll, whose odyssey included four deployments in Iraq andAfghanistan in the same 3rd Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment for which Regan served. Carroll returnedto Duke and won the NCAA championship as a 29-year-old starting defenseman this year.

One the newest lacrosse players turned special operators is Air Force Lt. John Krzyminski. As a cadet atthe Air Force Academy, Krzyminski captained the lacrosse team and served as wing commander, theacademy's version of class president. On Sept. 26, he graduated from the Air Force's Pararescue schoolat Kirtland Air Force Base, one of just 26 still standing from an initial pool of hundreds. His enlisted

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Cardiovascular endurance andfull-speed body tness. Speed andcoordination beats raw size andpower.

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Competitive mindset, poise inpressure situations, willingness togrind through training. According toformer Air Force defenseman andCombat Rescue Ofcer Lt. Col.Thomas Stephens, "The grind is verysimilar. You gotta pay the pricebefore you make it through Indoc(Pararescue selection). Thattranslates very well to lacrosse.When you start in January or evenfall ball, all those weeks, you get tiredof hitting each other. It's a verysimilar work-up to going onmissions."

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Ability to thrive within specializedroles, support teammates. "You gotdefensemen, attackman, faceoffspecialist, goalie," said Rorke Denver,a former Syracuse All-American andNavy SEAL training ofcer. "Samething in a special ops team: You gotsnipers, breachers, communicationsspecialist, a medic. Hopefully, if youdo it all well, it comes together insome alchemy of winning. It's theultimate sport for any military joband denitely for special operations."

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A 2010 study commission by theNavy found that SEAL candidateswere likely to do better if they grewup in the bad weather of NewEngland, where lacrosse is mostpopular, or in the rugged terrain ofthe West, where the sport is growingthe fastest.

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Special operations recruits havecollege degrees more often thantypical enlistees, and lacrosse hastopped NCAA graduation statisticsamong team sports for years. "Wedon't take stupid," Denver said. "Ihave two guys with master's degreesin physics in my platoon. Very fewpeople realize how bright andcreative and kind of devious andcapable guys in special operationsare."

classmates, which included two other former lacrosse players, became Pararescuemen, or PJs, while,Krzyminski graduated as a Combat Rescue Ofcer (CRO).

"To be a CRO or a PJ, you need to be strong enough to lift a guy over your back but you also need to havethe endurance to go on missions that might be 48 hours straight without rest," said Krzyminski, who isheaded to Ranger School before taking command of a Pararescue team (special operators from differentbranches routinely train with each other). "Being a contact sport really drives the mental tenacity you needto survive in special operations. I think about what I learned in lacrosse, how to rise above pressure and notbe intimidated by your opponent."

Perhaps the "secret sauce" isn't that lacrosse prepares players for special ops, but acts as a lter, attractingthe same high-intensity personalities who might have found special ops anyway. That seems the case for"Ben," a PJ currently overseas who requested his full name not be used due to the sensitive nature of hismissions.

Ben played lacrosse as a child near the Onondaga Reservation in central New York, but quit for a familymove. He came back to the game only as a college sophomore, transferring to a Division III school inPennsylvania that agreed to give him a shot. He graduated as the school's all-time scoring leader, despiteplaying just three years and essentially having to relearn the game.

Looking for another challenge after lacrosse, Ben became interested in the high standards of Pararescue.

"As I started training, I kept thinking, this is a lot like training for lacrosse," he said. "This is great if I couldget paid to do it. It was a whole new set of challenges that I was not good at, and just like lacrosse, I wantedto get better."

Matt White was a Pararescueman (PJ) in the U.S. Air Force and Alaska Air National Guard. He has writtenfor Los Angeles Magazine, Washingtonian and SB Nation.

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Apr 9, 2012

NNaavvyy SSEEAALL AAtthhlleetteess -- LLaaccrroossssee

Navy SEALs discuss how their experience as lacrosse players in high school and college contributed to their profession as elite special operatorstoday. Teamwork and the warrior mentality are shared by both SEALs and lacrosse players.

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