Wyler makes an immediate impact at CGA
Talented freshman is happy with the choice he made
New London — When he was still in high school, Anthony Wyler was part of a commercial for Old Bay Seasoning, helping to advertise a staple of the Chesapeake Bay area.
Now, Wyler is still helping to promote a Chesapeake Bay area feature. Lacrosse.
A freshman midfielder on the Coast Guard Academy men's lacrosse team, Wyler won a national championship in high school as a member of the lacrosse program at The Boys' Latin School of Maryland in Baltimore under legendary coach Bob Shriver.
Wyler, despite standing 5-foot-9, had Division I potential; Shriver swears by it.
But in wanting to follow his sister Victoria, a graduate of the Air Force Academy, into the military, Wyler eventually wound up as a part of an up-and-coming, second-year varsity team at Coast Guard, which brought in 16 freshmen this season.
It is that same Coast Guard team which defeated Clark University 8-7 in overtime Saturday at Cadet Memorial Field to go to 7-3 overall, 1-1 in the New England Women's and Men's Athletic Conference. Clark entered the game at 8-1.
“I love it, just the atmosphere,” Wyler said Saturday, following the win, in which he scored a second-half goal. “This is my favorite team I've ever played on. Every brother loves everyone. It's hard (being a freshman at the academy); it's intimidating. But (the upperclassmen) treat us as if we are seniors.”
“That makes me cry,” Coast Guard coach Ray LaForte said of Wyler's affection for his new team. “But that's the program we're trying to paint. … We're 24 months ahead of where I figured we would be. I'm elated.”
Wyler has nine goals and six assists this season, neither of which lead the Bears. Wyler is more of a facilitator, running the basketball equivalent of the halfcourt offense from up top.
According to LaForte, however, that's all it takes to make Coast Guard a better team.
“Just the amount of confidence that comes off him,” LaForte said. “The guys have gravitated toward letting him lead. Anthony has a confidence and a skill set. Everyone on the team is grabbing a small part of it, something they see him do. It's not monstrously showing up in the stats, but he draws people to him. He moves the ball like a really great point guard.”
Wyler, a 2015 graduate of Boys' Latin, is from Fulton, Md., a 40-minute drive from the school where he was a three-sport athlete, participating in football and wrestling, as well as lacrosse. Wyler is also an Eagle Scout.
He attending Boys' Latin was a choice he had to make between being a big fish in a small pond or being challenged by playing with and against some of the best players in the nation in the Maryland Interscholastic Athletic Association.
Shriver's teams earned three
“I love it, just the atmosphere. This is my favorite team I've ever played on.”
ANTHONY WYLER, COAST GUARD FRESHMAN MIDFIELDER
No. 1 national rankings during the coach's 36-year career. Wyler's teammates at Boys' Latin, meanwhile, have gone on to play for Division I lacrosse royals Johns Hopkins, Syracuse, Loyola, Penn State and Notre Dame, currently ranked first in the nation.
“He's a terrific athlete,” Shriver, in his first year of retirement from coaching, said this week of Wyler.
“He's not the biggest kid, obviously, but he's very well built. He's a powerful kid. He's tough as all get out and he's very skilled. It's a pretty good combination.
“He's a Division I lacrosse player. He could play anywhere as far as I'm concerned. He's got a great motor. This is a really, really good lacrosse player.”
Wyler said Shriver always got on his players about playing full speed.
“He always said if we made a mistake or did something stupid going 150 percent, he was OK with that. If you make a mistake going 50 percent, I'm not OK with that,” Wyler said. “… It was nuts. Everybody pushed everybody. That made us keep working.”
Wyler said his family had no military history before Victoria attended the Air Force Academy. Victoria was a ballet dancer her whole life, Anthony said, and everyone expected her to attend a liberal arts school.
A few visits to his sister at Air Force, as well as a stint at Coast Guard's Academy Introduction Mission (AIM) program, made Wyler pursue a bid at a military academy … in addition to some persistent recruiting from LaForte, who packed his family in the car one weekend under the guise of going to see a Yankees-Orioles game and headed for Baltimore to see Wyler.
Wyler is majoring in naval architecture/marine engineering.
On Saturday, he was behind the Coast Guard goal to retrieve an errant shot and sprinted quickly around the left side of the net, sliding and scoring to tie the score with Clark, 6-6, with 10 minutes, 49 seconds remaining. Senior midfielder Justin Huemme scored the game-winner in overtime, setting off a Bears' celebration.
“It's hard academically,” Wyler said of what is taken to adjust to the academy. “I took a semester to get settled down with school work.
“… After AIM, I talked to my dad and mom a lot. They asked what I wanted. I committed to Air Force, but it wasn't as close of a connection as here. It's more of a family atmosphere here, like Boys' Latin. I just want to play lacrosse. When you look at this place, it's just as challenging as DI.” v.fulkerson@theday.com