2021 Shore Sports Network Boys Lacrosse MVP: Rumson’s Patrick Jamin

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It’s no surprise that a team that finished No. 1 in the Shore Conference and No. 5 in New Jersey is loaded with talent and impact players. Patrick Jamin was one of those players for Rumson-Fair Haven, a do-it-all senior midfielder who affected the game in countless ways.

For a player of his caliber and influence, it’s conceivable – expected, really - that describing the impact he made for the Bulldogs would take a detailed, multi-layered response. For Rumson head coach Marc Moreau, however, it was actually pretty easy to describe what Jamin meant to his team.

“One word,” Moreau said.

“Everything.”

The 2021 Shore Sports Network Boys Lacrosse Most Valuable Player, Jamin was omnipresent for Rumson in 2021. He did a little bit of everything to lead the Bulldogs to a 20-1 record, the Class B North division title, the program’s seventh Shore Conference Tournament championship, the program’s fifth NJSIAA state sectional title, and another distinction as the Shore Conference’s best boys lacrosse team. A fantastic two-way midfielder, Jamin played on the first offensive and first defensive midfield lines for RFH, played on the top extra-man opportunity unit, the top man-down unit, and the first face-off unit. He rarely came off the field, and when he did need a breather it was usually only for a minute or two.

All those responsibilities and shifts didn’t hold him back in the offensive end, either. It was quite the contrary as Jamin totaled career highs in goals and points, finishing with 50 goals and 44 assists for a team-high 94 points. He was third in the Shore and 14^th in New Jersey in points.

“Every year he got a little better; a little better on offense, better at defense, better at being a vocal leader,” Moreau said. “And his senior year, he became really exceptional at everything.”

Jamin is obviously a highly-skilled player, but that wasn’t what made him the Shore Conference’s MVP.

“It’s really his will and his intestinal fortitude,” Moreau said. “He is not our most skilled offensive player, but he has a determination to be successful that is greater than everyone else on our team and probably the other team.”

“And he has a high lacrosse IQ. We don’t run set plays. We have sets and concepts out of those sets, but for them to be successful they need to be able to read and react. He’s the one doing that and doing it at a high level. He has a stat line that looks like he’s an attackman. He’s helping the other guys around him become better decision-makers, better finishers. It’s one thing to pass the ball to the right guy, but you have to do it at the right time and in the right spot. To have 44 assists for a midfielder is pretty remarkable.”

Another thing about Jamin is that he was incredibly consistent. Moreau could basically count on him for two goals and two assists per game. And late in games, he always knew No. 34 would have an extra gear when other players might be running on fumes.

“He plays so much of the game and what is so impressive is when you get into the fourth quarter there are guys who are tired and fight through it, but you can tell they’re tired,” Moreau said. “Their posture changes, their body language changes. His doesn’t change. He’s just as tired as everybody else in the fourth quarter but it never looks like it. He plays exactly like the first quarter when he was fresh as a daisy. To me, that stands out the most. He’s an elite athlete.”

‘Embrace the grind’ has been on a t-shirt or two for who knows how many athletic programs. It’s a mantra Jamin truly embraces and it’s evident by the decisions he makes. Also a standout wide receiver for Rumson’s powerhouse football team, Jamin has decided to continue his career at Middlebury College in Vermont in part because he will be allowed to play both football and lacrosse at the collegiate level.

“And throw in that it’s a demanding academic institution. They’re off the charts,” Moreau said. “But that’s what he is, he’s a grinder and he loves the grind. When you play high school sports you have way more practices than you have games and he never showed up to practice like it was the last place he wanted to be. He was always one of the first ones out on the field, organizing everybody into our stretching lines, things like that.”

He led by example most of the time, but as a senior he became an extension of the coaching staff in terms of both strategy and motivation. He had the pulse of the team and of the coaches, and often took matters into his own hands.

“Luckily for us as coaches he’s been around for four years and he knows when we’re not playing well and when we’re getting fed up as coaches,” Moreau said. “On more than one occasion this year when we’d call a timeout or at the end of a quarter he’d look over to the four of us and say, ‘I got this’. As a coach, that’s invaluable. When the players are correcting themselves, ultimately that’s when they can become as successful as they can be.”

Jamin finished his career with 206 points on 88 goals and 118 assists. Whatever he was asked to do, he did so at a high level. He played in all situations, made those around him better, made his coaches' jobs a little easier, and did it for one of the best lacrosse programs in New Jersey.

That, in a nutshell, is an MVP.