CLASS OF 2022
This Class continues to honor more of the players from the 1960’s who helped to originate and lead the initial years of the program; and the first team from 1962 which "Started it All". All of the individuals were known to have excelled on the field, and it is their on-field talent, coupled with their contribution to the team’s origin that adds to their legacy as Hall of Famers.
Phil Bodenhorn (1966-68), Midfield, Captain, Most Outstanding Player 1967. Phil played several positions on the 1966 varsity lacrosse team, coached by Carl Runk. In high school, he was a multi-sport athlete and two-time Arizona High School Champion Decathlete. At Arizona, he picked up a lacrosse stick with dorm mates who were playing on the WCLA Conference Champion Arizona Lacrosse Club Team and was encouraged to join because “…we can always use a player who can run.” Phil participated in team activities in 1966, initially as a defensive midfielder. As his off-hand finally came around, he carved out a more offensive role and focused on becoming a face-off and fast-break specialist. In 1967, he was voted Team Captain and led the team in scoring and defensive takeaways and garnered First Team Midfield consideration as a WCLA All Star, as well as Most Outstanding Player for the year. He graduated as a University Freeman Medalist and served a 26-year career as a commissioned officer in the United States Army Special Forces. After his retirement from the Army, he served as an Intelligence Supervisor in the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Throughout his career, he maintained involvement in the sport—coaching both high school and college lacrosse programs and seeing his son Brad become an attackman at Denison University and son Greg an All-American defenseman at Duke University. Philip lives in Carlsbad, California with his wife Karen.
James Bruner (1964-1966) Defense. Co-Captain, 1965 Championship team. Jim grew up in Dayton, Ohio and started college at Northern Arizona University. He transferred to UofA and was introduced to lacrosse by Dave Handschumacher (UofA Hall of Fame 2021) and Jay Lehr (UofA Hall of Fame 2019) who he met in a Hydrology class. Jim worked on ships for the Navy for several years based out of Maryland in 1969-1971, then returned to Southern California and taught High School physics and geology, and coached football. He traveled throughout Pacific, Middle East, South Asia , Nepal, Tibet, Afghanistan, North African and Europe on a 15 month sabbatical and “got lucky” with his first marriage in 1989. Jim has one wonderful daughter, born in 1989, and retired after 42 years of teaching in 2008, and lives in Long Beach, CA.
Dave Clarke (60-64). Dave is credited as one of those who was at the forefront of the origin of Arizona lacrosse. Dave is noted as a native of New England, who played at Boston University. Upon relocating to Tucson, Clarke introduced Cooper to McChesney, Lehr and Golos, and this group of five soon became the core movement to create a lacrosse team at the University of Arizona. Dave was the Director of Community Ministry at St. Bartholomew’s Episcopal Church in Manhattan, NY for many years, and a Deacon for over 40 years.
Cody Copeland (1963-1965) Midfield, 1963 First team All-Star, 1964 Most Outstanding Player, 1964 WCLA First team All-Star. 1965 Championship team. Cody grew up on Long Island, NY, graduating from Mineola High School in Garden City Park in 1960. He played lacrosse in high school. After high school he elected to join the Marines, but decided to defer military service until after college. Through a connection of his father’s, Cody ended up at the University of Arizona. As a lacrosse player at UofA he was known as one of the most productive midfielders in Arizona history, as well as one of the nation’s top goal scorers in 1963. He was in the ROTC program for 4 years at UofA, and after graduation from UofA in January 1966, he was commissioned a second lieutenant in the US Air Force, and went on active duty with the job to launch Minuteman ICBM (intercontinental ballistic missiles) in case of war. He served in the Air Force until January of 1970. He then obtained a Master's Degree in Education at the University of Wyoming and worked as an educator until his retirement in 2014. He is also a licensed multi-engine pilot and flight instructor.
Dave Handschumacher (1964-1966), Attack, Captain, Most Outstanding Player 1966, 1965 Championship team. Dave was a WCLA All Star in 1964-1966 and participated in the USILA North-South All Star Game. Dave had the unique opportunity to play for both the first high school and the first college lacrosse programs to gain varsity status "west of the Mississippi". He was introduced to lacrosse Howard "Mac" Fish (Princeton, All American '52) at the Webb School in Claremont, California. In 1959 "Mac" established a competitive high school team at Webb that was miraculously granted full varsity status and co-founded the California Lacrosse Association (CLA). Over the next 4 years, Dave led Webb in scoring, was twice selected to CLA All Star teams and became the 1st recipient of the "Mac" Fish MVP Trophy. Dave was also the first-ever recipient of the Helms Athletic Foundation Medallion given to California's Most Outstanding High School Lacrosse Player. After a year playing for coach Bruce Alison at Union College in upstate New York, Dave transferred to the University of Arizona (UA) in 1964. Here he learned UA had a fledgling club lacrosse team coached by Jay Lehr (Princeton All American '57) that competed against the same CLA teams Dave had played against in high school. Dave joined this team for the 1964 season. After only three games, the "desert miracle" happened. The Athletic Department under AD Dick Clausen leadership, elevated the team to full Varsity status, making UA the first college to establish a varsity lacrosse program "west of the Mississippi". In 1965, Carl Runk returned to coach the team through it's first full-season as a varsity team. Dave considers being selected as a junior to lead this team as captain through this inaugural varsity season to be his greatest-ever lacrosse honor. And what a season it was! The team accomplished the impossible, going undefeated (11-0), capturing both the WCLA and Rocky Mountain Conference championships with two wins against the previously undefeated Air Force Academy. At year's end, Dave got the opportunity to oppose (and beat) his legendary coach Runk while coaching in the first-ever high school game played in Arizona. In his senior year, 1966, Dave was again named captain along with defensive star Jim Bruner. For the third year in a row, he led the team in scoring securing his third first-team WCLA All Star selection. He was also nominated for UA's Outstanding Athlete award and most important of all, gained national exposure for western lacrosse by being the first-ever player selected from "west of the Mississippi" to play in a USILA North-South All Star game. Sadly, the 1966 season ended with the team's varsity status revoked The "miracles" had ended, but not before Coach "Mac" Fish (Webb School), AD Dick Clausen (University of Arizona), Dave and many others had achieved major milestones in the annals of western lacrosse history.
Richard Orville (1962-1964) Most Outstanding Player 1962. Richard "Dick" Orville received his undergraduate degree in Physics from Princeton and came west to the University of Arizona to study for his doctorate degree in Atmospheric Physics & Dynamics. Dick quickly fell in with the other east coast men who were building the lacrosse team in Tucson. He was a welcome addition to the program and was named the team's first Most Outstanding Player in 1962. After receiving his doctorate degree from Arizona, Dick went on to work as a professor for 23 years at the University of Albany before moving to College Station, Texas where he served as a professor at Texas A&M University until his retirement. Dick currently lives in College Station, TX with his wife Barbara, who he met and married in Tucson in 1964.
Neil Stroman (1962-1965), Defense, Most Outstanding Player 1965, 1965 Championship team. Neil grew up in Buffalo, NY and had never even seen a lacrosse game until he played in one at the University of Arizona. He saw a flyer for a new lacrosse club on campus early in his freshman year and decided to give it a try. Neil had a defensive-minded temperament and no experience with a lacrosse stick, so it was decided that he should be a defenseman. During his four years at the University of Arizona, Neil played in every club and varsity game, except for one in Los Angeles where the smog made him sick.
Anyone that has ever experienced an upstate New York winter can understand why Neil chose to attend the University of Arizona, despite never having been there before arriving on campus. After graduation, Neil headed back east and attended George Washington University for his MBA in Hospital Administration. During his final year at GWU he moved to Boston for his Administrative Residency and played for the Boston Lacrosse Club.
After graduating from GWU in 1969, Neil spent the next two years on active duty as a Medical Service Corps officer in the Army, where he met his wife Mary Ann, an Army nurse, and included one year in Vietnam. Once his ROTC commitment was fulfilled, Neil pursued his career in hospital administration in the Boston, MA area, with a few brief assignments up and down the east coast. While living in Boston, he played for the Commonwealth Lacrosse Club for eight years, matching up against local colleges and participating in the Boston Summer League. Neil returned to upstate New York for the last 10 years of his hospital administration career, serving as the President of two rural hospitals located between Rochester and Syracuse.
Neil and his wife have three children, two sons and a daughter, and live in the Richmond, VA area. He has five grandchildren, and lives close enough to regularly play catch with the four (two boys and two girls) that play lacrosse – with his wooden stick of course!
The 1962 Team. "The Team that Started it All". Organized by 2019 Hall of Famers Chuck McChesney, Jay Lehr and Don Golos, and Coached by Carl Runk (UofA HOF 2019); this Original squad played the First game of lacrosse representing the University of Arizona on March 24, 1962; suffering a 5-3 loss to the lacrosse club from Claremont College. At the end of the season, they finished with a 4-6 record, including two wins against the reigning California Lacrosse League champion San Marino lacrosse club. Other opponents included The Phoenix Lacrosse Club, University of Colorado, Denver Lacrosse Club, and the Air Force Academy. This team set the stage for what would become a Varsity program in 1964. Other UofA Lacrosse Hall of Famers who played on this team are Willy Cooper (2019) and Bob Kasten (2019), and Cody Copeland (2022), Dick Orville (2022) and Neil Stroman (2022).
