Southern Ontario’s Lacrosse Excellence All Comes Down to Infrastructure

The Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area (GTHA) is home to more than 7.2 million Canadians, spread throughout the vast expanse of Southern Ontario. In addition to operating as a world class center for business and culture, the region serves as a hotbed for all things sports, with the presence of the NLL, NHL, MLB, NBA, MLS and CFL down to the youth and amateur levels of athletics. This territory goes toe-to-toe with any municipality in North America when it comes to the culture of sports.

While long existing as a haven for hockey and basketball talent, GTHA locales like Whitby and Brampton, along with several autonomous localities around the province of Ontario (including Peterborough, Orangeville, St. Catharines and the Six Nations of the Grand River reserve) have emerged as undisputed centers of lacrosse sophistication.

Ontario’s significant standing in the realm of box lacrosse exists via a variety of factors. The most prevalent dynamics involve the scores of former and current NLL talent working as youth coaches around the province, combined with the existence of perhaps the finest box/field lacrosse practice facility in the entire world.

Two NLL legends turned guiders of lacrosse’s next generation are Colin Doyle and Dan Dawson. Doyle played 19 seasons (15 with the Toronto Rock), winning six league titles and was recently inducted into the NLL Hall of Fame. Dawson, who retired prior to last season, ran the floor for 21 seasons, winning two championships and finishing his career near the top of the all-time lists of goals, points and games played.

Both men were born and raised in the GTHA and currently work in advisory roles for the Toronto Rock organization, along with holding director titles at the Toronto Rock Athletic Centre (TRAC).

“There is no question that the TRAC is the best lacrosse facility in all of North America, and ultimately, probably the world,” gleams Doyle. “This world class facility enables us to put together whatever we want in trying to grow the game. Because of the facility, we can do field lacrosse, box lacrosse and host tournaments. We can also do skills training. It really enables us to do all of that without any of the barriers that come with most places, trying to find somewhere to grow a program like this. So, the cart before the horse is the TRAC. Without it, everything we do becomes an awful lot more complicated.”

“It’s the best facility in the world, and without guys like Rock owner, president and general manager Jamie Dawick, we could not grow the game,” shares Dawson. “There’s been a direct correlation between the TRAC and the growth of youth sports in the Greater Toronto Area. The amount of programming, [and the number of] tournaments and partnerships with the Canadian Lacrosse Association and Ontario Lacrosse Association, we’ve done some really cool things and created some amazing experiences and memories, and that’s what it’s all about. Our job is to make sure the place is packed and we continue to grow the game at the grassroots level.”

Located in the Toronto suburb of Oakville, Dawick’s visionary 80,000-square-foot complex features two indoor regulation size turf fields, ample locker and fitness space, a Rock-themed pro shop and a bevy of hospitality rooms. Outside the walls rests an NCAA/FIFA certified turf field designed to host soccer, football, field hockey and rugby competitions. The TRAC is also the headquarters for both the Rock business and lacrosse operations.

Most rinks in southern Ontario are hybrids, meaning they have turf in the summer but switch to ice in the fall, winter and spring for hockey. The TRAC is an anomaly. Other year-round turf facilities include the Iroquois Lacrosse Arena in Six Nations and Memorial Arena in Brampton.

Doyle and Dawson work with a collection of coaches and staff including Challen Rogers, Nick Rose and Brad Kri. Men who have dedicated their non-NLL lives to cultivating the next generation of Rock, Bandit and Mammoth players. At any given time, a group of Rock players and Toronto area NLL luminaries are roaming the halls of the TRAC sharing everything they know with those so yearning to learn the game.

Doyle estimates that between 400 and 700 boys and girls train or play at the TRAC during a typical season, whether it be the regular participants in programs, leagues and camps, or the young players from other parts of Ontario who may spend time at the Oakville facility on a less frequent basis.

“We want to build a place where all youth players have something really tangible for them, that they can attain,” explains Doyle. “The involvement with the Toronto Rock players and Toronto Rock facility, we’re just trying to foster a brand and culture where everybody can grow, and then ultimately individuals will grow. They’ll take their skill set, what they’ve learned, their leadership and teamwork qualities back to their local clubs, but ultimately, have the Rock brand. We’re trying to promote an environment where kids can get better, putting a big emphasis on sportsmanship, and all those other things that we think are so valuable, as well as skill.”

Dawson, who was born in Oakville, about 10 minutes from the TRAC, looks back at the period when he first picked up a lacrosse stick with bewilderment, admitting to a little bit of jealousy regarding the level of infrastructure and technology accessible to the local youth of today.

“I started in the sixth grade,” recollects Dawson. “If we were to do a winter session, it would be in a small public school gymnasium, and balls would be flying. Looking back, it was actually super dangerous. I don’t know how they let us in there. And now we have these two indoor turf pads, NHL size arenas and an outdoor turf field. The athletes themselves are part of the YouTube generation, the access they have to online learning and training is unbelievable. The athleticism of these young athletes is phenomenal, and that’s been the biggest difference.”

“When I was young, you had to put a net outside to shoot in the winter,” reminiscences Doyle. “And that was if you were lucky to get a net and had space to shoot. Facilities like this or the Iroquois Lacrosse Arena in Six Nations didn’t exist, and it would have changed my childhood greatly. We talk about it all the time. The opportunities for these kinds of things didn’t exist. You couldn’t play in the winter. There was nowhere to do it. I would have quit hockey a lot earlier if I could have played this game year-round.”

Both Doyle and Dawson are over the moon regarding all the advancements in lacrosse participation and achievement throughout Ontario, with as many as 50 players annually heading to the United States to participate in NCAA competition. The game is growing in both familiar and unfamiliar spots, raising the level of talent and opportunity no matter where one calls home.

“It’s so gratifying. We send kids off to the NCAA, we send kids off to play junior lacrosse, and hopefully, over time, a lot of these players that we’re working with, we will see them playing in the NLL,” conveys Doyle. “It’s gratifying on a smaller scale to run into these kids throughout the summer, when we’re just all doing our own lacrosse thing, and to see them play, and to be able to point to somebody and say he plays the game the right way, or she plays the game the right way. That, to me, is the greatest part of all this.”

“Growing up, a standard final group would be Orangeville, Whitby, Peterborough, Six Nations and St. Catharines. And then every year, within any age group, it was those guys in the eight tournaments, which is your highest level. Now you’re seeing places like Burlington, Oakville and Mimico. If you drew a circle around the TRAC, a lot of that comes together,” opines Dawson.

When discussing the keys to re-creating the GTHA lacrosse experience in other parts of North America, the whole ballgame once again centers around fashioning places like the TRAC, providing aspiring players with a world class setting, where world class coaches utilize every available tool in the toolbox.

Both Doyle and Dawson know how lucky they are. Despite residing in the penthouse of lacrosse’s operational capability, these living legends would love nothing more than to share the wealth with anyone willing to give lacrosse a shot.

“The biggest thing holding the game back is not enough great facilities. The talent is out of this world, but they lack facilities. And the biggest kind of shortage in the United States is having more facilities where kids can play,” orates Doyle.

Proclaims Dawson: “If you build it, they will come. I wish every township and every city had a lacrosse-only facility, and you’d see more and more people play the sport. First and foremost, it’s just getting sticks in hands, school programs, and introducing it to new Canadians and Americans. This is a wicked sport. I do believe sports is this universal language. And if we just show the game to kids, I think it sells itself.”

Regardless of where in the Greater Toronto and Hamilton area they may grow up, one thing is certain — All lacrosse players end up at the TRAC one way or another.