John Paul is a Michigan man. But about a year ago, he almost left the school he loved. The only school he’s ever wanted to be a part of.

Paul had been a student at the University of Michigan. He has been involved in its club lacrosse program for 26 years, first as a player, then as an assistant coach and the last 14 years as its head coach. In 2010, he and his wife decided that last season would be his final with Michigan. After accomplishing almost everything he could with the Wolverines club lacrosse team, in his mind it was time to move on.

But late last May, Michigan gave him a reason to stick around.

On May 25, the Michigan athletic department announced the expansion of its varsity sports, upgrading men’s lacrosse to the varsity level. After more than 70 years stuck in the club status, Michigan is the first power-conference school in 30 years to add lacrosse as an NCAA-level sport. Though the move sent a rippling effect through the lacrosse community, Paul’s primary concern is establishing a winning attitude in the team’s first season, an opportunity he’s grateful to have after coming so close to walking away from Ann Arbor, Mich.

‘It was a bit of a relief,’ Paul said. ‘I’ve been here my whole life. I had gone to school here and worked here, been coaching here. … If nothing was going to happen, then we were going to move on, and this is allowing us to stay, which is the only place we want to be.’

Though lacrosse is just being added to an athletic department that is composed of 27 varsity teams, Paul said the club team positioned itself to move up to varsity sooner than this year. The Wolverines won three straight national titles at the club level from 2008-10. Equipped with a winning tradition, an organized structure and a donor base that cultivated interest throughout the university, the only component missing was an athletic director willing to take a risk on a sport that’s been slow to grow beyond the Eastern Seaboard.

Enter Michigan Athletic Director Dave Brandon. Paul said without Brandon, there’s no way Michigan has an NCAA lacrosse program.

‘We had everything in place to make this a fairly easy decision, but we could have had 99 other athletic directors and it wouldn’t have happened,’ Paul said. ‘We got the right one.

‘He wasn’t just instrumental, it was him. None of this happens if we don’t have an athletic director whose entire vision is about growth.’

But the reason Brandon made the push is because of how lacrosse has continued to grow.

In a blog entry Brandon posted the day of the announcement, he pointed to how the sport continues to increase in popularity and participants.

In the post, he noted ESPN televised more than 70 games across the networks platform in 2011 alone. He also pointed out that in the state of Michigan over the past 10 years, 130 men’s and women’s high school teams have been added.

Even with those reasons listed, there was some risk for Brandon making the big move.

Paul admits Brandon is throwing a lot of money at the upstart program.

J.D. Johnson, a junior on the squad, said the risk doesn’t involve on-field performance, but putting varsity jackets on a squad of club players and whether they can handle the transition.

One player who never thought he’d even have a shot at earning a varsity letter was fifth-year senior Trevor Yealy.

Yealy said he heard rumors there was always a shot at varsity lacrosse, but nothing substantial enough to get excited about. Yealy thought by the time it happened, he’d be gone.

Wrong.

‘Once we actually started becoming more clear and concrete last year, that’s when we thought this might actually be happening. Here we go,’ Yealy said.

And with an opportunity Yealy never saw coming, the attack and the rest of his teammates are in a unique position. The Wolverines go from a club team that dominated opponents to a team that lacks Division-I talent. They go from a club program that has high standards to a team that has to reach new levels.

Yealy said he’s aware things might not come easy for the newest team on the block. For the first time in his Michigan career, losing might be the final result.

‘We know it’s going to be difficult,’ Yealy said. ‘We know there’s going to be bumps in the road and there’s going to be close games.’

Paul also has no disillusions of what his team is capable of in its first year. His squad might not win a single game, but the record is irrelevant.

This year’s team has a higher calling. If future teams want to have a winning tradition, ‘team one’ — as the Wolverines are known around campus — has to set the tone for that.

Paul said the mission for his team is in its control. Developing an elite Division-I culture is the only thing they can dictate.

‘That’s something we can control, and that’s something that can set us up for the future, and that’s something our players are excited about to be honest with you,’ Paul said. ‘This may be their one shot as we recruit. Who knows how long an opportunity each of them will have, but they have yet to leave their mark on team one.’

Paul set the tone early by bringing in former military men to run practice of intense and grueling workouts called ‘Judgment Day.’

Players didn’t need lacrosse equipment. It was replaced with logs and heavy sandbags they had to carry while sprinting. They even carried one another down the field.

Every exercise had to be perfect. If a player gave 99 percent, it wasn’t good enough.

Johnson said the workout allowed him to demand more out of his teammates.

‘It gave us a little insight in what a Division-I culture looks like,’ Johnson said. ‘Basically, we need to be perfect, and this is the way to do that.’

Zach Elyachar, who played club lacrosse for four years and graduated in 2009, said this team probably won’t reach a final four this year or win even 10 games. But with what Paul has in place, it isn’t crazy to think three or four years down the road Michigan could contend in Division I.

‘I’m glad J.P. was given this opportunity to be the head coach that leads us into our first varsity season, and I hope he’s there for a long time to continue,’ Elyachar said.

And so begins the birth of the Michigan varsity lacrosse program. Ironically, it coincides with the birth of Paul’s first child, a baby girl born a few weeks before the season officially got underway.

But rather than starting a family away from Michigan, Paul can raise his infant daughter at the only place he knows as home. A place he never wants to even think about leaving.

‘I’d like to retire here,’ Paul said. ‘This is where we made our home, and this is where we want to keep our home.’

dgproppe@syr.edu

Published on February 15, 2012 at 12:00 pm