On the officials side, I was once again swamped and inundated by the amount of experience in the rooms. I got to attend Al Blau’s presentation on “How to Handle the Difficult Situation,” which was absolutely fantastic. He gave great advice for every official on how to handle difficult coaches, players, fans, and even fellow officials that may prove adversarial. I gained a lot of new techniques that will hopefully make me a better official this year.

Jerry Markbreit

The best part on the official’s side of things was the very first keynote address for officials. The keynote speaker was Jerry Markbreit a long-time NFL referee, who is now in charge of NFL officials training. He related hilarious story after hilarious story, including one where he nearly got into a fight on the field with a player! It was one of those speeches that you could hear 100 times and still be entertained by it. It was a great way to wrap up the day.

While the presentations and speeches ended, that was not the end of the second day. The coaches and I relaxed in the hotel for a bit, and then got together with a few other friends to one of the oldest family-owned restaurants in the United States – Ralph’s. I have never seen veal parmesan as large as a loaf of bread. I got a tremendous ziti with mushrooms and shrimp. Word of the day on the food? Strong! After the truly exceptional meal at Ralph’s we all headed back to the hotel lobby where we hung out with fellow coaches and officials. I went back to the room a little early to study, and prepare for the Level 1 training that I was going to teach on Sunday night.

For Day 3 there was not too much going on. The convention was winding down, and the Philadelphia Convention Center was being turned around to host another event. I did attend the “Train the Trainer” presentation, which detailed everything that US Lacrosse is working on to improve the development of new and experienced lacrosse officials. I gained a few useful bits of information before having to head back to the airport for our one o’clock flight. Only, thanks to Andy, we didn’t have to wait till one o’clock. We got through security so fast that Coach Andy asked the attendant if we could get on the 11:40am flight. They had plenty of room on the flight, and we were stoked that we did not have to wait in the airport lounge at all.

All of us made it back safely on an uneventful flight. Satisfied in a great weekend full of lacrosse and lacrosse knowledge. As I did last year I highly recommend attending the convention for any aspiring coach or official. On top of seeing a lot of cool lacrosse swag, there is an abundance of knowledge for everyone who attends the presentations. I would like to thank Coach Lou for taking Shaun Lux, Andy Halperin, and I to the convention, and I want to thank all three of those guys for making this year’s convention an absolute blast.

Cheers,
Gordon