Rob Grabill is one of those known for wearing many hats. The former Hanover High boys soccer coach takes the reins of the Sunapee High girls varsity soccer program this year. He is also a minister.
Lately, the soccer and minister hats have occupied less time in his world thanks to the new hat of writer/researcher, the one that has come to dominate his days.
Grabill is writing a book expected to be in the neighborhood of 64 pages that will sell for $20 at the 50th anniversary of the Lions Twin State Soccer Cup on July 26 at Hanover High School.
That game will pit the top recent high school graduates of Vermont against their New Hampshire counterparts in two games, a men’s game and women’s game.
All proceeds from book sales will go to the Lions charities of helping people with vision and hearing problems in Vermont and New Hampshire.
Grabill’s plan is to update the book each year and have it available for the new year’s fans in an effort to continually support the charity.
It might be difficult for some to believe that the event has been around for 50 years.
Football was the big game in town. The Shrine Maple Sugar Bowl, a similar all-star game between Vermont and New Hampshire, began in 1954.
Soccer was slow to gain a foothold. Games were rarely covered by the media and an afterthought on the athletic spectrum.
But Vermont began recognizing a state champion in 1957 when Stowe edged Essex 4-3 and New Hampshire began the chase for a state title the next year with Goffstown edging Colebrook 2-1.
It was thought that the Lions soccer event would be launched in 1974. That game was derailed when Middlebury College officials were notified by the NCAA that the school would be in violation of NCAA rules by hosting the game.
Those details were ironed out and the game made its debut in 1975 at Middlebury College with Vermont winning 2-1.
Vermont won the game the first three years including a score fest 8-4 result in 1976. New Hampshire won the contest the next four years.
The women’s game was not added until 1983.
The competitiveness of the game is one aspect of the series that struck Grabill during his research.
“Thank goodness that with Vermont and New Hampshire there has been so much competitiveness,” Grabill said this week. “You never know who is going to win. It is not a mismatch.”
Grabill has 50 years of deep appreciation for the Lions event as a coach and fan. He would never want to see the stories from the earliest years be forgotten.
“While some of us are still able to tell stories, let’s get the stories down,” Grabill said.
He has not only done meticulous research of game programs and newspapers, but also covered miles of asphalt for interviews to collect these stories.
Another thing that has struck him while getting his fingers dirty poring aging printed material is the quality of the players and coaches in Vermont and New Hampshire soccer circles.
They might be small states, but the number going on to make their mark nationally is disproportionate to the population.
Mike Noonan and Kyle Dezotell are just two of many examples of this.
Noonan is the men’s soccer coach at Clemson where he has reaped the National Coach of The Year accolade twice. He was an All-American player at Middlebury College and led the University of New Hampshire as a coach to the program’s first NCAA tournament in 1994.
Dezotell, today the head coach of national Division III power Tufts, was the Vermont Gatorade Player of the Year in 1998, a season in which he scored 36 goals for North Country Union High School.
He is still the all-time leading career goal scorer at Middlebury College.
There will be numerous more stories of soccer nobility from the two states in the book.
You will meet players with inspirational stories in the book, players like Stevens High School’s Don White who has a father in Pete White with special connections to Vermont.
Pete White coached a Vermont state championship baseball team at Otter Valley in 1963, the year the Otters defeated Rice 6-4 in the big game. Pete also coached soccer at Black River.
Young Don scored all three goals for New Hampshire in the 1980 Lions Cup at Middlebury College, a 3-2 win over Vermont.
But the biggest part of that story is that White was not on the original team. He was called to the team late after camp had started when Fall Mountain’s Jim Collins decided to play Legion baseball instead.
Ironically, Fall Mountain and Stevens are nearby rivals.
White was the only player to score three goals at the event until Omar Daoudi scored three in the 2024 game, a 5-2 Vermont victory.
Jim Collins wrote a book titled The Last Best League. It is an entertaining look at the Cape Cod League, a loop regraded as the best summer collegiate baseball league anywhere.
Rob Grabill’s book also promises to be an entertaining and informative read.
