Fresh off re-signing with the California Redwoods, Chris Merle teamed with PLL Play and special guest Dylan Laube – running back for the NFL’s Las Vegas Raiders – to lead the latest edition of the PLL Coaches Education Series.
While Merle has excelled on the field for the Redwoods the past three seasons – and provided the coaches in attendance with several drills that involved clearing and ground balls – the short-stick defensive midfielder’s big message was about the importance of building a championship culture.
Merle provided several examples of how to foster a positive environment in the locker room, all of which starts with the leaders of the team. Laube, who played football and lacrosse with Merle at Westhampton High School on Long Island, vouched for his credibility.
“Chris is one of the best captains I’ve ever been around,” Laube said.
In order to create the best team culture – which takes time to cultivate – Merle said it begins with the leaders: the coaches and the captains.
Merle offered words of wisdom to the coaches in the way of mottos his teams and coaches preached during his lacrosse career, one of which was “Calm breeds calm.” This applies to a coach’s demeanor. The players feed off a coach’s energy, Merle explained, so in a hectic and pressure-filled environment at the end of a game, if the coach is calm about the situation, then the players will be calm and relaxed, as well, allowing them to take in every instruction and react accordingly.
As for the captains, Merle said it’s important they “lead from the front” – that bringing the equipment out to practice shouldn’t be reserved for the freshmen and newbies but for the captains. If the leaders of the team are willing to put in that effort, then it trickles down through the rest of the roster.
A popular yet possibly unconventional way to help foster team cohesion is through team book studies. Merle has been a part of them at both the University of Virginia and last season with the Redwoods, when the team read Jon Gordon’s The Energy Bus together. Merle explained how reading a book as a group brings a team together and aligns everybody’s goals. He even bought every player on the Redwoods a copy of Gates of Fire, a historical fiction book about the 300 Spartans against the Persian army.
Merle said that every team has a “crucible moment,” a trial the group goes through that reshapes a team’s identity. For the Redwoods, that moment came in training camp leading up to the 2025 season.
It was challenging, he said, to learn from new leaders and new schemes after the Redwoods hired new head coach Anthony Kelly and general manager Joe Spallina. But reading The Energy Bus and participating in the Five H’s exercise – where individuals share their hero, hardship, highlight, hope and what they find hilarious – and being vulnerable and open with each other helped them come together as a team.
That togetherness proved to be crucial to California’s success during the 2025 season. The team endured a midseason five-game losing streak that had it sitting in the penultimate spot in the standings. The Redwoods continued to fight together, however, and ended the season with a three-game winning streak, advancing to the semifinals and earning a spot in the 2026 Championship Series.
