Client Case Study: Focus on the Field helps Alameda Lacrosse succeed in bringing the game to more kids

By Connor Buestad 

When speaking with the staff at Alameda Lacrosse Club, home of the Alameda Attack, you can’t get far in conversation without learning about how passionate they are in upholding their mission statement. Alameda Lacrosse makes it clear that their mission is to cultivate an atmosphere where kids can work on becoming good citizens and leaders in the community. Honoring the game’s Native American roots is a centerpiece of the club’s philosophy. 

“We always want our program to be competitive and we want our kids to learn the game, but we also want them to realize who came before us and what the history of lacrosse consists of,” says Alameda Lacrosse president Deryck Wade. “Native Americans played lacrosse in part to create peace. We try to honor that history when we take the field as well.” 

Back in 2010, the Alameda Lacrosse program was created as a 501c3 non-profit, guided by the principals that Wade still stresses today. They started with one under-9 team and have worked up from there, eventually working up to seven total teams between the girls and boys program. The club got its start when Wade and his colleagues realized that many Alameda residents had to leave their city to play the game they loved. 

“At the time I was a high school coach at Bishop O’Dowd High School in Oakland and I started to realize many of the great athletes who came on campus were from Alameda. I also realized a lot of them had not played as much lacrosse growing up as they would have liked. I saw a void there that I thought could be filled,” explains Wade.

Indeed there was a void that needed to be filled, as the three Alameda high schools including St. Joseph's, Encinal and Alameda, all don’t offer lacrosse as an official varsity sport. In response, Wade teamed up with a host of people around the area to make a push for more lacrosse in the city.

With the help of a group that included Eza Roizen, Willie Ngyuen, Steve Rochlin, Alexandra Barnish, Anna Dagger, and more, Alameda Lacrosse has slowly built itself into a club that kids and families can rely on for great lacrosse.  Eventually, the club hopes to have a big enough impact on the community that the area high schools eventually adopt lacrosse as varsity sports. 

As the Alameda Lacrosse club has grown over the years, so have the demands on its hard working and dedicated staff of volunteers. The club relies heavily on parents who pitch in to make all of the administrative tasks work out for the players on the field. Many volunteers have kids who have already aged out of the club and moved on, still the parents love to give back as much as possible. 

This passion for the game and community engagement is what helped Wade reach out to Focus on the Field and see if there was a way for the company to help them out and ease some of their administrative burden the club was experiencing. No matter how dedicated parents have been in helping the club grow, there always seems to be one more task to complete, one more email to send, one more phone call to make. 

“Our goal has always been to build an organization that has great stability and institutional memory. We want to have a club that outlasts the people contributing in a given year, including myself. We wanted sustainability with our operations that will last for years to come,” says Wade.

Focus on the Field has provided just that, helping Alameda Lacrosse bolster their communication with parents, improving the online registration process and helping with practice and game scheduling. FOTF has also contributed to Alameda’s COVID-19 protocols, player recruitment, social media marketing, uniform purchases and website management. All this has been with one goal in mind, help Alameda Lacrosse keep their attention between the lines as much as possible and promote the growth of the game on a daily basis.

As coach Wade and his staff look to the future, they know how many challenges lie ahead. Working with area park officials and high school administers during a pandemic is anything but easy and has taken up a large chunk of time. Time that they would rather be spending out of the field. Fortunately, Focus on the Field will be helping with just that. Hopefully, for many years to come.