Daniel J. Mannix, an executive with a leading Salt Lake City, Utah probate solutions firm, coaches high school students playing competitive lacrosse. As junior varsity coach at Juan Diego Catholic High School in Draper in 2014, Daniel J. Mannix played an important role in helping a student recover from a life-threatening brain injury to learn to play the game again.
The student suffered a traumatic brain injury in a 30-foot fall off a theater set at the school. Statistically, the teen’s kind of injuries leaves 9 out of 10 survivors in a lifelong vegetative state. Initially, doctors were afraid he would never be able to leave a skilled nursing facility since he was unable to even speak, respond, or walk.
But after constant efforts from the staff of Primary Children’s Hospital to reach him, and buoyed by the love and faith of family and friends, the teen began to respond. After a grueling, months-long recovery process, he returned to the school and the sport he loved – lacrosse.
Coach Mannix, who had known the teen for much of the young man’s life, worked with the family to figure out the safest ways for him to play the high-collision sport. Lacrosse is generally viewed as posing a moderate risk to health and safety for young people, with a concussion the most frequent above-the-waist injury. But with the team’s help, the student was able to follow precautions that allowed him to enjoy the game again.
For Coach Mannix, it was about even more than the game: He wanted to give the injured teen and the other students a chance to grow emotionally and as human beings, to become better people.
Daniel J Mannix 