Private School Lacrosse Thread

[Anonymous]

Does anyone have a recommendation for a good Rec team or clinic for a 12 year old boy new to the sport, athletic & plays hockey, soccer, etc. Is hoping to play on the middle school team.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Does anyone have a recommendation for a good Rec team or clinic for a 12 year old boy new to the sport, athletic & plays hockey, soccer, etc. Is hoping to play on the middle school team.

For the Winter - Next level clinics as they are in doors and so weather isnt a factor. Plus all the Fall clnics are pretty much over. Next level has very good indoor clinics on turf with good coaches. For Spring he should do Bethesda rec if you are in DC or MD.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:I know there has been a lot of negative posting about boys MadLax but I’m wondering if anyone has insight into the new girls program. They have great coaches and my DD is considering a switch. I’m not interested in feedback about past boys experience, just wondering if the girls program is starting off strong or weak. TIA

The thread PP linked you too is very informative. The Madlax girls program as of now is a disaster, not surprisingly. They do not have enough players to go to Fall tournaments in all but one age group (think its 2024?). The players on their rosters are girls who were unable to make any other team. Also, some of the training seesons are with the boys which for many girls is a negative. This is not a good program.

Rec is far better if your daughter is still a beginner. If she is no longer a beginner, and wants to play for a club team, she is going to have a much better experience at Pride or Cardinal or Bethesda or Next Level, and if she is more experienced/talented, at Stars or MC Elite. These programs have all been around for a while and are fully or mostly run by women who have coached and played the game for years.

I seriously doubt Madlax girls will ever become a strong program. First, the existing programs especially Stars and Pride and MC Elite (and Capital for HS) are far too well established, well-run and solid, for Madlax girls to ever become a premier program. Additionally, being attached to MadLax is a deal breaker for many parents.

It sounds like it won't be something that can work for my DD then. She is already on a strong club team where she has played for 4 years but there have been a few issues this year with a coaching switch that made us think about looking elsewhere. Of course the other teams that she could have (likely would have) made are not taking new girls at this point so I'm inclined to have her deal with the coaching challenge she has this year and look next fall. She's a 2021 and given the change in rules for recruiting freshman year is less critical than it once was.

Yeah, Madlax doesnt even have a stand alone 2021 team. They have a 2020/21 combo team (so weird) but it only has 15 players.

I'm curious what team your 2021 is on. Clearly not Capital since she would have just started with them. If she decides to try out for Capital next year, I will tell you that the Capital Blue 2021 head coach is fantastic. He coached my DD last year and he is a great coach and a great person. Of course its the top HS team in the metro aree and very hard to make. I have heard good things about the 2021 MC Elite team too.

Playing for a coach who is tough to deal with is actually good training for college anyway.

She can definitely stay where she is and have a strong season, we just have an issue with how the coaching change was communicated after the fact since she primarily stayed to play for the coach she has loved for three years. The club director took over her team and we aren't big fans of this individual, though they are well knows in the lacrosse community and have merit as a coach (just not a good communicator at all from a parent perspective).

We will see how the year goes but I'm pretty sure moving to Madlax isn't the answer.

Ah, I am betting you play for Rebels. Heard they did a coach switch after tryouts. I am really sorry about that. I hear the coach who moved was pretty great. Madlax is definitely not the answer if your DD plays at that level.

The Rebels 2021 black team is very strong so I suppose it shouldn’t have been a surprise that Haight took over but it’s frustrating when the old coach was a great lacrosse skills coach, a strong leader and a caring person. Great coaches are rare and when you find one who nurtures your child both on the field and off it’s hard to walk away.

[Anonymous]

Boys' Middle School: I know most private schools require sports participation. Do the boys who go on to play lax in HS play on their MS teams? Landon for example? Do the HS coaches recruit from those teams?

[Anonymous]

Most private schools field a middle school team. Normally Landon and Mater Dei tend to have strong middle school teams.

I would imagine any HS coach would know who their up and coming stars are with in its walls.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Most private schools field a middle school team. Normally Landon and Mater Dei tend to have strong middle school teams.

I would imagine any HS coach would know who their up and coming stars are with in its walls.

Thanks. For my DS#1's sport, the HS coaches worked very closely with the MS team to make sure their players were ready and had the skills they wanted for their HS players, and it was a lot harder to make the team if you hadn't been doing the MS team, even if you were doing one or more travel teams. The just knew the MS boys a lot better.

[Anonymous]

What is a preferred walk on for college recruitment purposes? Is that person a "recruit"?

[Anonymous]

Spot on team but on your own with admissions.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What is a preferred walk on for college recruitment purposes? Is that person a "recruit"?

Technically they are a "recruit". But using the NCAA's definition of "recruit" includes just about anyone who has had any kind of contact with a school's athletic department or coaching staff. (Read the NCAA booklet so you can become familiar with the terminology and the rules. Do NOT listen to other parents. Some don't know the terminolgy or the rues and some are quite willing to allow the uninitiated to believe things that aren't strictly true.)

In reality, there isn't such a real thing as a "preferred walk-on. You won't find that written anywhere especially in the NCAA booklet on recruiting and scholarships.

A Walk-on is a Walk-on and all that really means is they are not being offered a scholarship or a fraction of a scholarship.

The 15 and a fraction total lacrosse scholarships are generally divied up in fractions, so there maybe 30 or more players that are getting about a half scholarship. A common practice is giving a 1/4 scholarship and then another 1/4th if you make satisfactory grades.

What it may give you tangibly is help in Admissions. The Lacrosse people submit a list of people they are trying to get. They have them listed according to priority. The scholarship players come first. The preferred walk-on are behind that group. There are always some walk-ons on every roster.

Paid official visits and scholarship money are how schools express concrete interest.

It's certainly a common pratice for a coach to encourage a perspective non-scholarship player to apply. They might say, "Come to our school. You are a player that can play for us we think." But if there's no scholarship involved, there's no commitment on the part of the coaching staff. They'd like 100 non-scholarship "recruits' to show up. Then they can try them out and keep the ones they like. The others get a practice t-shirt and some well wishes.

[Anonymous]

Like I wrote spot on team no help in admissions.

[Anonymous]

Right but the other poster is a lot smarter.

[Anonymous]

I'd say the smart one condensed the info into one sentence.

[Anonymous]

Not if you read the original post correctly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Like I wrote spot on team no help in admissions.

There's certainly no guarantee of a spot on the team to so-called "preferred" walk-ons. Lacrosse teams aren't allowed by their Athletic Departments to have unlimited roster sizes.

In fact, without some help in Admissions, there is nothing there at all. I't's an empty promise

There is in all college recruiting a degree of chicanery. These coaches are adults. These jobs are their careers. They do this recruiting stuff all the time.

[Anonymous]

The 15 and a fraction total lacrosse scholarships are generally divied up in fractions, so there maybe 30 or more players that are getting about a half scholarship. A common practice is giving a 1/4 scholarship and then another 1/4th if you make satisfactory grades.

It's actually not 15 scholarships. A fully funded D1 Men's lacrosse program has 12.6 scholly's to distribute across the entire team.