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Walsh Found Handball Niche, Helped Win Three Titles

Story and photos by Eric S. Bartelt, Assistant Editor

Brian Walsh grew up 40 minutes from the U.S. Military Academy in Orangeburg. He was a versatile athlete, having competed in football,
wrestling, baseball and lacrosse during his high school years.

At one point, he visited the academy as a football and lacrosse recruit and settled on lacrosse as his sport at West Point.

A couple months into his time at the academy, it became clear because of the time needed to participate in a corps squad sport that lacrosse wasn’t for him. Then he reflected back on the conversations he had during Beast with his company commander, Brian Lucas, a team handball player, that handball, a club sport, might be the sport for him.

Lucas, class of 2006, who also went to the same high school (Bergen Catholic in New Jersey) as Walsh, along with Javier and Jamie Sanjuan (both class of 2007) were the biggest influences in Walsh finding his niche with the handball team.

“They were all from the same area as me,” Walsh said. “The Sanjuan’s went to my rival high school and Brian went to my high school. We’re all very close friends. I’m an only child, but they took care of me like I was their little brother. “It all started out like a Family environment, but then they left,” he added. “But, the atmosphere stayed the same even with new people coming in. Our mentality is blue collar-like, where every practice we would punch in and we would be all business-like and then we punch out at the end of the day and we would all hang out together.”

It was that environment that helped Walsh through his four years at the academy and led him to earning his diploma and second lieutenant bars May 23. It was also that environment, with the close bonds, that led to the on-court success and the three national championships that Army Team Handball has achieved the last three seasons.

Walsh, who was team captain this year, was a prime contributor to the team’s success as he was the team’s leading scorer the last couple of seasons and probably the team’s best and most versatile player.

“Brian is a huge reason why we’ve been national champions three years in a row,” Army Team Handball head coach Maj. Travis Habhab said. “For one, he is a phenomenal athlete. He’s one of the fastest guys you’ll ever see playing this game.

“More importantly, No. 2, he’s a guy who accepts nothing short of winning. His ultimate goal is to win every game he plays, even if he knows he’s considerably outmatched in experience,” Habhab added. “He believes he can go out there and help bring the team to victory. He’s got the desire to win and probably his biggest trait is his extreme intensity.”

The firstie leaders of this year’s squad besides Walsh were Justin Key and Jake Abramowitz, who together enabled the team to win another championship. Walsh, Key (left wing) and Abramowitz (right back position) were the team’s top scorers during the season.

“I would say the thing we did best together was making it a team sport because, if one person tries to take it all upon himself, it can’t be done,” Walsh said. “I would say we probably had less (individual) talent this year than we had in the past, but we had a better team. We did a great job helping the underclassmen play well together.”

In the ultimate of “team first” moves, Walsh moved from left back to the center back position at the beginning of the season to improve the team’s chances at winning. However, in the end, the move was more beneficial for Walsh, even though the left back position is more of a scorer’s position, because it helped him get into the Army’s World Class Athlete Program.

“(At the center back position) you have to be aware of both sides of the court more and the move is similar to moving from shooting guard to point guard in basketball,” Walsh said. “I liked the transition because when I’m playing in the World Class Athlete Program, the left and right backs in the pro leagues are about 6-foot-8 and 6-foot-9, and I’m only 6-foot-2- inches, so for the long term, it’s better to start learning that position because it’ll benefit me more.”

Handball has brought many great moments to Walsh’s life and will continue to do so as he competes in WCAP with a chance to play for the U.S. Olympic Handball Team in 2012.

“I think it’s a great opportunity to go train for the Olympics,” Walsh said. “I never would have expected that before I came here because I didn’t even know what the sport was. Whether I would have gotten into WCAP or not, I still would have the Army in my future. It doesn’t matter to me which path I would have taken.”

The engineer officer will have to wait to do his Basic Officer Leadership Course and Engineer Officer Basic Course, which he was scheduled to go to Dec. 9 at Fort Carson, Colo., because of a tear he got in the front of his calf during the USA Handball Open Nationals May 10.

Army, who was the only collegiate team to play in the USA Open Nationals, won its first two games, but lost the last three because they lost Walsh to injury.

“We shouldn’t have lost, we should’ve beaten them all,” Walsh said. “I don’t know if we weren’t as focused, but the game we won the night before (my injury) ended in a shootout and it was a high intensity, great game and I think everyone didn’t have any adrenaline left.”

In the next three months, Walsh will do physical therapy here to come back from his injury.

Walsh said he’s 50-50 from what the doctor tells him whether he’ll be ready in August to go to BOLC.

The injury was just another factor on how stressful this season was for him, but all of it didn’t take away from how great his collegiate career turned out.

Walsh felt this year was a strain because they were expected to win. Defeating North Carolina 38-26 in the final was anticlimactic compared to the semifinal victory over Air Force.

Of the team’s three consecutive championships, Walsh feels his best memory of Army Handball was their first championship his yearling year.

“The first championship we won was my best memory because my freshman year we were awful,” Walsh said. “To turn the team around just like that in one year and win nationals was a pretty good deal. We had the athletes my freshman year to be able to do it then, too, but we weren’t as focused.”

Habhab, who coached Walsh the last year-and-a-half and this past year as the head coach, has seen much growth in Walsh as a leader during that time, which is why he nominated him for the 2008-09 Men’s Team Handball Athlete of the Year.

Walsh was one of the four finalists for the award and the only collegiate athlete to make the Top 4.

Habhab sees great potential in Walsh, a potential that could make him one of the best players in the United States.

“I think Brian can be a huge part of the U.S. Olympic Team,” Habhab said. “He’ll definitely be a big part of the U.S. National Team as he continues to develop and learns the sport more and gets more experience.”

For as much as Walsh is excited about playing in WCAP and for the U.S. National Team, he is just as excited to be an officer in the
engineer’s branch.

“Engineers was actually my second choice for branch, but as I did more research on it I think I’m more satisfied with my second choice than what would have been my first choice,” Walsh said. “I just hope that when I come back from the (WCAP) program that I’ll be able to get to Sapper School and Ranger School because I can’t go before the program.”

Walsh’s final day as a cadet came May 23, but he was less excited about the graduation process than he was about the significance of being pinned as a second lieutenant.

“A bunch of us don’t even need to go to the ceremony, we would just be fine leaving right now knowing what we’ve done,” Walsh said. “I’m more excited about the commissioning than I am about graduation, so the bar pinning ceremony will be a lot more important to me than the actual graduation.

“However, for as much as it is about me,” he added, “it’s about more than me. It’s about all my friends, my Family and everyone who went through (these last four years) with me. It’ll be a great day.”