David Dyson was ready to start a youth lacrosse program in Dighton and Rehoboth.
The first-ever president of the Dighton-Rehoboth Youth Lacrosse program had spent time watching and coaching some of his current players in Seekonk, which competes in the Rhode Island Youth Lacrosse League, but felt it was time to start a similar program in his own backyard.
Dyson had previously introduced the sport of lacrosse to the regional high school, which now sponsors both boys’ and girls’ varsity lacrosse teams. Initially, each team started as a club program that faced some unique challenges during its first season in 2015, including finding teams to compete against, but after that first season concluded, the current and first-ever boys’ varsity lacrosse coach at Dighton-Rehoboth Regional High School felt it would be beneficial to elevate both squads to varsity so they could compete in the regional high school’s main athletic conference, the South Coast Conference (SCC).
And since becoming a varsity program in 2016, both high school teams have exhibited signs of growth and improvement, but still have a long way to go before accomplishing the ultimate goal of winning a state championship. Winning a state title would certainly mean a lot to both teams, as well as Dyson, too, but what will certainly help Dighton-Rehoboth Regional High School become more competitive in the future is its current youth players that are competing this spring in the Dighton-Rehoboth Youth Lacrosse program.
The current youth program – or technically the thought of it – truly began with some conversations last March, according to Dyson. The conversations morphed into creating a website for registration to spreading the word through flyers and social media. And as a result, the program welcomed roughly 150 participants in its first season – one should certainly expect that number to balloon next year and beyond.
“It’s been a great first year,” said Dyson. “We started putting together [plans for the program] well over a year ago – it was probably about a year ago as of last March to be exact when I started talking about it. And my feeling was if I didn’t do it, somebody else was going to do it and I really wanted it to be in the system I have the high school in, so we would have a nice feeder program (for future members of both teams).
“So, we got it up and running and it took a full year to get things going from the website to registration and stuff, but I was already offering the D-R Youth Lacrosse camp for the last couple of years, so kids were getting used to [the sport] that way, and then were playing in Seekonk, but now we were bringing all these kids back [to our home towns].”
Those kids, which Dyson referred to, make up eight teams that compete in the 1/2, 3/4, 5/6 and 7/8 levels. Having at least one boy’s and girl’s team compete in each division is certainly a tremendous accomplishment for a first-year program, which Dyson thought would only attract 75 to 100 participants between the two towns, not 150. “I was never expecting where we were at today,” he said.
Dyson certainly deserves some credit for a successful first year of the program. He has drummed up some serious excitement for the sport over the past few years through both his summer camps and fall clinics, which led to organizing teams to compete at Fore Kicks in Taunton, Massachusetts this past winter.
In addition to growing interest through camps and clinics, it also appears that members of each town have been very welcoming to the new program, including Rehoboth Youth Soccer with providing fields to practice on, so all eight units will be ready to compete in games and jamborees.
“We were blessed enough to have a gentleman that had three fields in the heart of Rehoboth that were relatively brand new that were designated for his club soccer (team), which he owns, Dyson. “Fields are very tough to come by, especially if you don’t have turf fields, so this was an absolute blessing.
"I've heard from multiple parents how much fun their son or daughter is having with their team"
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Photos courtesy of Emma Dyson, D-R Youth Lacrosse