If you grew up playing soccer in the area, chances are you have a story about Larry Poirier.
I could write a book about memories of Poirier, the current Mohawk Trail Regional High School boys’ soccer coach, a man I’ve known since I got into the sport as a youngster. After playing the sport himself as a kid, Poirier got into coaching just out of high school and he’s been doing it ever since, working with various youth programs, as well as coaching at four high schools in Franklin County. On top of that, he also played the sport until he was 60, giving it up just a few years ago.
It’s for that reason that Poirier was recently awarded the C. Bradley McGrath Award for Distinguished Service to Soccer by the Connecticut Valley Soccer Officials Association. The award is given annually by the organization to a person who has had an impact on the sport in Franklin and Hampshire counties.
Poirier’s impact on the local soccer scene is not something measured in wins and losses. Those numbers are not something Poirier has kept. How could they be? The man has coached all over the place and at all levels. He has coached children at the youngest levels, and worked with high schoolers and adults.
“I love the game, and I like being around the youth,” Poirier said. “I appreciated the award, but it was nothing I was looking for. I just love being involved with soccer.”
Poirier grew up playing soccer in Greenfield and competed on both the middle school and high school teams in town. His interscholastic playing days ended when he graduated from GHS in 1971, but he began volunteering to coach youth soccer soon after, and in 1975 he started coaching for Des Pullen in the old Greenfield Recorder Soccer League.
If you were a kid growing up in this area in the late ’70’s, ’80s or early ’90s, there is a good chance you played soccer in the Recorder League. The league took place at Greenfield Community College during the summer months and was an extremely successful program run by Pullen. There were camps during the day and league games at night, and both were very well attended. Childhood friend Sean Doton and I used to walk out behind my family farm (which borders GCC) and crawl under a barbed wire fence to get to our games, and it was here that I first met Poirier, who has a son, Justin, about my age who also played in the league.
“Des Pullen was really big and helpful in developing soccer in this area,” Poirier said. “Not only from my perspective, but in players like you, the number of players who went through the Recorder Soccer League who are still playing, coaching or officiating.”
Another person who Poirier said helped him get into coaching was Jon Lapean, who was Poirier’s sixth-grade teacher and later his varsity coach for the Green Wave.
“I learned the game primarily through him,” Poirier said. “He was my elementary school teacher in Greenfield, and I can remember that we would be at Ambercrombie Field, and we would be out there playing in four inches of snow at recess. Later, I had him as a coach in high school. He was a real humane coach. He was interested in learning to love the game. He taught me that you can treat kids nice and help guide them along and get them to love the game.”
Poirier has had his hand in all sorts of soccer-related things since 1975. He spent roughly 15 years with the Recorder League, and coached at Gill Elementary School from 1986 through 1991.
His career coaching at the high school level began when he worked as an assistant girls’ coach at the junior varsity level at Northfield Mount Hermon School and later moved on to coach the junior varsity team at Mahar Regional School, where he stayed for 10 years. He spent a season at Franklin County Technical School as an assistant varsity coach, and was then hired at Mohawk to coach the boys’ varsity team, which he did for five years.
He then got a teaching job at Mahar and returned to that school for three years as a junior varsity coach, and then got a job teaching at Pioneer, where he spent two years as the girls’ varsity coach. He left due to health issues, but went back to work at Indoor Action, where he spent four years as the soccer coordinator. He began coaching at Mohawk again during that time, but had to leave after five years because of a conflict with work. Five years after that, he is once again back at Mohawk.
“I’ve been everywhere,” he joked. “I may not have been the most successful coach in the world, but I’m someone who loves it.”
Poirier said he is most proud of the men and women he has worked with over the years who have gone on to give back to the sport themselves. People like Dan Guertin (current Mahar boys’ coach), Jenna Carme (current Franklin Tech girls’ coach), and Dale Totman (current Frontier boys’ coach and two-time defending WMass champion).
“I’m not going to try to claim that I’m responsible for them, but I was around them, and that makes me proud,” Poirier said.
And for this reason and many more, Poirier earned the distinct honor of the McGrath Award.
Jason Butynski is a Greenfield native and Recorder sportswriter. His email address is jbutynski@recorder.com. Like him on Facebook and leave your feedback at www.facebook.com/jaybutynski.