Before a recent MCLA match between Cal and UC Santa Barbara, the two coaches, Ned Webster and Mike Allan met at midfield. When they started talking about their similarly aged kids, Allan recommended a children’s book to Webster called “Princesses Wear Pants,” a book about empowering young girls. He caught himself for a moment.
“It was funny to be talking about a children’s book about princesses when we were on the field,” Allan said.
The context can be explained by the past four decades.
Cal’s Webster and UCSB’s Allan have been friends since they were 5 years old, but lacrosse has intertwined their lives well beyond friendship. Webster and Allan were elementary school teammates in the 1980s, played each other in both high school and college through the 1990s and coached against each other both professionally in 2000s and now collegiately.
That process has spanned 41 years, beginning as teammates at the Towsontowne Recreation League in Baltimore and continuing as coaches across the country in California.
“I don’t think either of us could have dreamed of these West Coast lacrosse scenarios for ourselves,” Allan said.
Lacrosse came naturally for Allan and Webster, growing up near Johns Hopkins and watching their fathers, who both played.
“I was one of those kids that had a stick in his hand before he could walk, and I’m pretty sure Mike was the same way,” Webster said.
After playing on the same team as kids, the two split up. They went to local rival high schools. Allan then played collegiately for Princeton, while Webster went to Notre Dame. They didn’t talk much after high school and only played against each other in college once as freshmen.
But college was where Allan and Webster both realized they could have futures in coaching. Allan — stuck as the fourth option behind the All-American trio of Jon Hess, Jesse Hubbard and Chris Massey — didn’t get much playing time at Princeton. And Webster missed the last two years at Notre Dame after tearing his ACL.
What they each soaked up observing from the sidelines helped transition them into coaching.
“It was sort of a humbling experience,” Allan said. “But also just to be a part of that program at Princeton at that time, just the stuff that I learned from those guys was just incredibly valuable as I started thinking about being a coach.”
Allan moved to California the fall after graduation to coach at UCLA, while Webster — admittedly bitter from injuries impacting his career — moved around a bit before settling into the Bay Area in 2006, coaching at Dominican University.
“It was hard on the sidelines, for sure,” Webster said. “I think it made me much more analytical about the game.”