From Spartans to Olympians Former LA athletes and their quest for gold By Philip Hersh ’64 (contributing writer)
A luger. A rower. Five hockey players. Two women, five men. They are Lawrence Academy’s Olympians — or, in one case, oh-so-close to being an Olympian. The whole idea of LA Olympians in these sports seems incongruous to someone like me, who was in the LA Class of ’64. In those days, the hockey rink was little more than what someone might assemble in a backyard — an ice sheet and boards near the windswept playing fields below the dining hall. Not exactly conducive to attracting Olympiclevel hockey talent. Even though the hill leading down to those fields was steep enough for some good sledding, it wouldn’t exactly be a luge track. And while many New England secondary schools have rowing programs, Lawrence is not one of them. Yet here we were, sharing Olympic memories over Zoom for an Alumni Speaker Series panel I moderated a few hours after the first 2022 Winter Olympics events had taken place in China. Ninety minutes later, 1984 Olympian Dave Jensen delivered a perfect coda to the conversation. Jensen transferred to Lawrence Academy as a junior after what he described as unhappy years at another school. He spent very little of his senior year on campus because of commitments to six months of Olympic preparation.
The support could come from a flexible academic program known as LA II, which helped both Jensen and 1994 Olympic luger Jonathan Edwards stay on track to graduate while rarely on campus. It could come from the decision to build an indoor hockey rink dedicated in 1972, or it could come from the hectoring and mentorship of longtime hockey coach Charlie Corey. (All four of the men’s hockey players on the panel — Jensen, Steve Heinze, Ted Crowley, and Craig MacDonald — went on to play in the National Hockey League.) Or, it could come from the school’s 1970 decision to become coeducational again, after seven decades of being all male, and the sports opportunities provided to young women including 1992 Olympic rower Cindy Ryder Matthes and 1998–2002 Olympic hockey player Laurie Baker McLaughlin, who were multi-sports athletes at Lawrence. There are recurrent themes in each of their stories. The pride each felt in representing his or her country in international competition is one such theme.“When you pull on that USA jersey for the first time in an Olympic game, it’s an indescribable feeling,” Jensen said.
“Coming to Lawrence Academy was the best decision I ever made for many reasons,” Jensen said. “I got the support of everybody on campus, academically or in sports. Everybody wanted to help you try to succeed.”
L-R: Charlie Corey, Steve Heinze, Dave Jensen, and Ted Crowley
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