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Thursday, July 2, 2020
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com SPORTS

‘The perfect storm’: Mbogo Mwangi speaks on race in America 
today, and how the lacrosse community needs to do better

Growing up on Manhattan’s 
Upper East Side, Mbogo Mwangi 
never dealt with race as an issue. 
St. Stephen of Hungary, the 
private Catholic school that the 
junior defenseman attended, was 
a microcosm of New York City’s 
melting pot. Because Mwangi 
and his classmates all came from 
different ethnic backgrounds, 
race became a moot point. No 
one was ever treated differently 
because of how they looked or 
dressed.
But in 2011, his family left 
the city for Radnor, Penn., a 
predominantly white, affluent 
suburban 
community 
on 
Philadelphia’s Main Line. That 
was where Mwangi first learned 
that he would not go through 
life without being judged by the 
color of his skin.
Transferring 
to 
Radnor 
Middle School, a school that 
was 99 percent white, Mwangi 
struggled with cases of subtle 
racism daily. People touched 
his hair. Curious eyes glanced 
over at him during his history 
teacher’s measly day-and-a-half 
lecture on racism and slavery. 
He was excluded from social 
events because his classmates 

feared their parents would be 
mad that he looked or dressed 
“differently.” 
“As a black kid growing up in 
this environment, you are slowly, 
calmly and subtly reminded that 
you are different because of the 
color of your skin, and you will 
be treated differently because 
of that,” Mwangi told The Daily. 
“It’s difficult, because when you 
don’t have anyone that looks like 
you around you, there’s nobody to 
really talk to. You don’t go home 
and talk about the issues you 
have with your parents because 
(the issues) are so small. … They 
are just kind of this undertone 
that walks around with you with 
every single interaction that you 
have.”
Sometimes, it wasn’t so subtle.
He remembers playing a game 
with a ball on a trampoline in 
eighth grade with three of his 
closest friends at the time. When 
the ball fell out and onto the 
ground, one of Mwangi’s friends 
suggested that he go get the ball. 
When he refused, the friend 
called him “his slave” and the 
n-word. 
It was the first time anyone 
had called Mwangi that word.
“In that moment, it was as 
if I was in a Matrix-type space 
where it was just all white 
around me and I was just kind of 

shook to the core,” Mwangi said. 
“It was one of those moments 
that I’ll never forget. … It seems 
like time kind of stops. You go 
within yourself and just start to 
question everything. It doesn’t 
seem real. And until you have 
had an experience like that, 
I can’t really explain what it 
means.”
The Main Line is one of 
the hottest lacrosse breeding 
grounds in the country, and 
all of Mwangi’s friends at the 
time were playing the game. He 
thought it seemed like fun, so he 
decided to give it a shot.
But 
even 
Mwangi’s 
first 
encounter with lacrosse was 
touched by racism. Playing a 
sport where only 4.4 percent 
of its NCAA Division I student 
athletes were black in 2019, he 
was judged by the color of his 
skin from the instant he stepped 
on the field.
Mwangi had never even picked 
up a stick before, so he naturally 
struggled at his first tryout for 
Radnor Youth Lacrosse. Unable 
to pick up ground balls with his 
stick, he crouched down every 
time the ball came towards him 
and picked it up with his hand.
“I 
was 
the 
worst 
out 
there 
obviously,” 
Mwangi 
remembered. 
“It 
was 
very 
evident that I was definitely out 

of my element.”
The next day, one of Mwangi’s 
classmates came up to him and 
asked him why he went to the 
tryouts. Instead of offering words 
of encouragement, his classmate 
suggested that Mwangi should go 
play basketball instead because 
“he’d probably be better at that.”
“As a Black person in America, 
you kind of learn what people 
mean when they say certain 
stuff,” Mwangi said. “That was 
one of those things when (I 
realized) that I’m not going to 
be able to play this sport without 
my race being a part of it.”
Mwangi stuck with lacrosse, 
and as he grew older, his skills 
developed rapidly.
Still, 
he 
was 
treated 
differently on the lacrosse field 
due to the color of his skin. 
Opponents yelled racial slurs 
at him on the field. He was cut 
from his summer club lacrosse 
team twice, suspiciously in favor 
of players Mwangi deemed less 
talented, before finally making 
it on his third try. When he 
decided to attend the Haverford 
School, an all-boys prep school 
and lacrosse powerhouse near 
Radnor, many people told him 
that he wasn’t good enough to 
go there and that he would never 
play.
But 
Mwangi 
used 
Black 
professional lacrosse players like 
Kyle Harrison, the first Black 
man to win NCAA lacrosse’s 
Tewaaraton 
Award, 
as 
his 
inspiration 
to 
keep 
pushing 
forward. Any comments that 
doubted his ability or stake in 
the game were absorbed and 
used as motivation. Harrison’s 
legacy showed Mwangi what was 
attainable for Black men who 
play lacrosse.
When 
Mwangi 
arrived 
at 
Haverford, he met his best 
friend, Isaiah, who is half-Black. 
For the first time since leaving 
Manhattan, he finally felt like 
he had someone to talk about the 
racial injustices he was dealing 
with. 
For the first time since moving, 
he found someone like him.
“Having my best friend also 
be Black helped with (all that) 
because (I was) with someone 
who (looked) like me,” Mwangi 
said. “We dealt with the issue of 
subconsciously being reminded 

that you’re not gonna be like 
everyone else (together).”
And on the lacrosse field, 
Mwangi saw the merits of his 
hard work pay off. The Fords 
won three consecutive Inter-
Academic League championships 
during his four years on the 
team. In 2018, Michigan coach 
Kevin Conry offered Mwangi a 
spot on the Wolverines’ men’s 
lacrosse team, making him the 
only player from his middle 
school class that would go on to 
play Division I lacrosse.
***
Two 
weeks 
ago, 
Mwangi 
led a Zoom video call with his 
coaches and teammates. The 
topic of conversation surrounded 
the issue of race in America, 
a response to the murder of 
George Floyd and ongoing Black 
Lives Matter protests.
Having felt the burden of 
racism on his shoulders his 
entire life, he finally felt like he 
had an opportunity to speak on 
the issue.
“I never really thought that 
I’d have a platform to speak 
on this,” Mwangi said. “Prior 
to everything going on, if you 
would’ve asked me if I would be 
the one to stand up and speak to 
a group of people that I trusted 
and are my friends about the idea 
of race, I would’ve told you that 
you were lying.”
Over Zoom, Mwangi shared 
his experiences as a Black man. 
After explaining how he gets 
pulled over by the police in his 
friends’ 
neighborhoods 
back 
home; after revealing that he 
has had job applications ignored 
because 
of 
his 
name; 
after 
pouring his heart out about how 
this is an issue of human rights, 
not politics, Mwangi hoped his 
coaches and teammates would 
begin to take the time to listen, 
to educate themselves and to 
pursue a more active role in the 
fight for racial justice.
Mwangi spoke of the idea of 
a “perfect storm,” in which the 
culmination of three “waves” 
have allowed the previously 
apathetic white population to 
become cognizant of the ongoing 
racial injustice that has festered 
in the United States for 400-plus 
years. 

PHOTO COURTESY OF MBOGO MWANGI
Defenseman Mbogo Mwangi has dealt with racism since he moved out of Manhattan and began playing lacrosse.

DREW COX
Daily Sports Writer

See ‘THE PERFECT 
STORM’
, Page 12

