Feedback on VLC Club Lacrosse?

[Anonymous]

Interesting view of the landscape and you apply a lot of assumptions. But if you take the 2027 team as an example, that team was rebuilt overnight and is stacked with a lot of great players. There is a tendency for kids to gravitate towards clubs that are closely aligned with their HS teams. Which HS does True VA align with?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I base it on the fact that over the last 2 years VLC has had multiple team implosions at 27, 28and 29. I agree that the teams that started before the Cavs merger are still pretty good. But once the 26s leave the stage it’s pretty much game over for VLC

Looking forward to True cleaning house at all ages this season.

I guess it depends on how you look at it. If your son played for True when it was NOVA Select way back in 2020 like my son did in the fall of 2020 then you could argue this is correct. There are 3 kids (him and 2 other boys) that were originally on his NOVA Select team that still play on the NOVA Black team at his age level and played when it started as NOVA Select through to True this fall. A couple of kids jumped over to VLC for a year then jumped back, some kids are now on the Green team and some kids no longer on in the program. Looking at the other age groups it isn't much different. This is at the youth level. HS is different.

And that is the issue that the pro-VLC posters don't seem to grasp. If you don't have a decent youth program, your HS program will fall off. While VLS might have better 2024 and 25 classes than True NOVA (no idea), but where do they sit at the youth level. At the 28 level True is absolutely better because, well, True has a 28 team and VLC doesn't. 29s given that most of the best players left VLC-See team to go to other programs (including True NOVA) my guess is that they are better and on down.

Speaking for the younger age groups, other than 28 where True has a very weak team and VLC has no team, VLC 29 Poon is well coached and has plenty of talent. It is still a better team than True 29 black. VLC 30, 31, 32 are all well coached and talented. True 30 is weak, 31 and 32 barely have 2 weak teams..

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Interesting view of the landscape and you apply a lot of assumptions. But if you take the 2027 team as an example, that team was rebuilt overnight and is stacked with a lot of great players. There is a tendency for kids to gravitate towards clubs that are closely aligned with their HS teams. Which HS does True VA align with?

True VA = O'Connell. VLC is more of a PVI team. Check their scores last spring. You still have Truly amazing dreamers posting here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Interesting view of the landscape and you apply a lot of assumptions. But if you take the 2027 team as an example, that team was rebuilt overnight and is stacked with a lot of great players. There is a tendency for kids to gravitate towards clubs that are closely aligned with their HS teams. Which HS does True VA align with?

Mostly schools in Arlington.

[Anonymous]

Isn’t the recruitment for VLC’s 2025s terrible?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I base it on the fact that over the last 2 years VLC has had multiple team implosions at 27, 28and 29. I agree that the teams that started before the Cavs merger are still pretty good. But once the 26s leave the stage it’s pretty much game over for VLC

Looking forward to True cleaning house at all ages this season.

I guess it depends on how you look at it. If your son played for True when it was NOVA Select way back in 2020 like my son did in the fall of 2020 then you could argue this is correct. There are 3 kids (him and 2 other boys) that were originally on his NOVA Select team that still play on the NOVA Black team at his age level and played when it started as NOVA Select through to True this fall. A couple of kids jumped over to VLC for a year then jumped back, some kids are now on the Green team and some kids no longer on in the program. Looking at the other age groups it isn't much different. This is at the youth level. HS is different.

And that is the issue that the pro-VLC posters don't seem to grasp. If you don't have a decent youth program, your HS program will fall off. While VLS might have better 2024 and 25 classes than True NOVA (no idea), but where do they sit at the youth level. At the 28 level True is absolutely better because, well, True has a 28 team and VLC doesn't. 29s given that most of the best players left VLC-See team to go to other programs (including True NOVA) my guess is that they are better and on down.

Speaking for the younger age groups, other than 28 where True has a very weak team and VLC has no team, VLC 29 Poon is well coached and has plenty of talent. It is still a better team than True 29 black. VLC 30, 31, 32 are all well coached and talented. True 30 is weak, 31 and 32 barely have 2 weak teams..

VLC 29 lost 4-5 good kids to True Chesapeake.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Speaking for the younger age groups, other than 28 where True has a very weak team and VLC has no team, VLC 29 Poon is well coached and has plenty of talent. It is still a better team than True 29 black. ..

The facts don’t support this position at all. True va 2029 beat VLC Poon in HOCO last year. https://www.ghclacrosse.com/schedule/team_instance/8576532?subseason=877480.

If you think it is just a one off kind of thing. True Black won their HOCO division and VLC Poon didn’t make the playoffs. Wanna try that again?

The other age teams haven’t played each other but time will tell but having watched some of the various True and VLC teams at those lower ages this summer. There isn’t that much of a difference or any at all. All are head and shoulders below the AAA and higher teams. Which teams got better is certainly a good question.

One program is bleeding players and having teams implode. The other isn’t.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Speaking for the younger age groups, other than 28 where True has a very weak team and VLC has no team, VLC 29 Poon is well coached and has plenty of talent. It is still a better team than True 29 black. ..

The facts don’t support this position at all. True va 2029 beat VLC Poon in HOCO last year. https://www.ghclacrosse.com/schedule/team_instance/8576532?subseason=877480.

If you think it is just a one off kind of thing. True Black won their HOCO division and VLC Poon didn’t make the playoffs. Wanna try that again?

The other age teams haven’t played each other but time will tell but having watched some of the various True and VLC teams at those lower ages this summer. There isn’t that much of a difference or any at all. All are head and shoulders below the AAA and higher teams. Which teams got better is certainly a good question.

One program is bleeding players and having teams implode. The other isn’t.

Wow True lacrosse marketing team in full effect. Sad thing is that at one time there were solid clubs that only took the best players from the top NVYLL teams and provided a showcase to college and started teams in HS. Now we have a big corporate national team and large organizations that run money making events. The current result=destroy easy entry rec lacrosse, less talent in the DMV with fewer players playing, weaker HS teams, less money in parents bank accounts, angrier parents. Great job! I miss the old Madlax teams

[Anonymous]

As has been mentioned before - rec does not provide enough lacrosse exposure to play at even competitive public high schools. At Langley, Madison, McLean, Yorktown and Robison the vast majority of starters played youth travel. NVYLL has an eight games regular season with primarily dad coaches. That’s not enough to get good at lacrosse.

The top NVYLL teams (eg Vienna, Dulles south) have majority travel players at least until 14u. So the handwringing about the death of rec doesn’t make sense.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As has been mentioned before - rec does not provide enough lacrosse exposure to play at even competitive public high schools. At Langley, Madison, McLean, Yorktown and Robison the vast majority of starters played youth travel. NVYLL has an eight games regular season with primarily dad coaches. That’s not enough to get good at lacrosse.

The top NVYLL teams (eg Vienna, Dulles south) have majority travel players at least until 14u. So the handwringing about the death of rec doesn’t make sense.

For decades NVYLL was enough to produce good players. The idea is you need more players participating to raise the bar for all levels. For the first time many HS teams are getting good turnout. Look at the class of 2024/2025 far less college recruits from public school than previous years. More population in NVA yet less lacrosse players. Trend for the sport is looking to be headed in the wrong direction

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Speaking for the younger age groups, other than 28 where True has a very weak team and VLC has no team, VLC 29 Poon is well coached and has plenty of talent. It is still a better team than True 29 black. ..

The facts don’t support this position at all. True va 2029 beat VLC Poon in HOCO last year. https://www.ghclacrosse.com/schedule/team_instance/8576532?subseason=877480.

If you think it is just a one off kind of thing. True Black won their HOCO division and VLC Poon didn’t make the playoffs. Wanna try that again?

The other age teams haven’t played each other but time will tell but having watched some of the various True and VLC teams at those lower ages this summer. There isn’t that much of a difference or any at all. All are head and shoulders below the AAA and higher teams. Which teams got better is certainly a good question.

One program is bleeding players and having teams implode. The other isn’t.

Wow True lacrosse marketing team in full effect. Sad thing is that at one time there were solid clubs that only took the best players from the top NVYLL teams and provided a showcase to college and started teams in HS. Now we have a big corporate national team and large organizations that run money making events. The current result=destroy easy entry rec lacrosse, less talent in the DMV with fewer players playing, weaker HS teams, less money in parents bank accounts, angrier parents. Great job! I miss the old Madlax teams

You make no sense! Believe what you want about VLC/True/ML/DCE/BLC/NL motivations, but they are all there to make money, and because they see a market to do so. None of the clubs are doing this for the love of the game / to grow the game, despite what they might say on their websites. And how does having more travel club options result in less talent in the DMV with fewer players playing? By your logic, more opportunity results in less talent? The B teams for each of the clubs might be on par, talent wise, with rec teams. So maybe an argument could be made to those parents that they should spend their money elsewhere. But ultimately it is their decision. And participation on a travel club in VA does not prevent the same player from also playing on their local rec team. I think that limitation is in MD.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Speaking for the younger age groups, other than 28 where True has a very weak team and VLC has no team, VLC 29 Poon is well coached and has plenty of talent. It is still a better team than True 29 black. ..

The facts don’t support this position at all. True va 2029 beat VLC Poon in HOCO last year. https://www.ghclacrosse.com/schedule/team_instance/8576532?subseason=877480.

If you think it is just a one off kind of thing. True Black won their HOCO division and VLC Poon didn’t make the playoffs. Wanna try that again?

The other age teams haven’t played each other but time will tell but having watched some of the various True and VLC teams at those lower ages this summer. There isn’t that much of a difference or any at all. All are head and shoulders below the AAA and higher teams. Which teams got better is certainly a good question.

One program is bleeding players and having teams implode. The other isn’t.

Wow True lacrosse marketing team in full effect. Sad thing is that at one time there were solid clubs that only took the best players from the top NVYLL teams and provided a showcase to college and started teams in HS. Now we have a big corporate national team and large organizations that run money making events. The current result=destroy easy entry rec lacrosse, less talent in the DMV with fewer players playing, weaker HS teams, less money in parents bank accounts, angrier parents. Great job! I miss the old Madlax teams

This has no context to what I wrote, but I guess whatever floats your boat.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Speaking for the younger age groups, other than 28 where True has a very weak team and VLC has no team, VLC 29 Poon is well coached and has plenty of talent. It is still a better team than True 29 black. ..

The facts don’t support this position at all. True va 2029 beat VLC Poon in HOCO last year. https://www.ghclacrosse.com/schedule/team_instance/8576532?subseason=877480.

If you think it is just a one off kind of thing. True Black won their HOCO division and VLC Poon didn’t make the playoffs. Wanna try that again?

The other age teams haven’t played each other but time will tell but having watched some of the various True and VLC teams at those lower ages this summer. There isn’t that much of a difference or any at all. All are head and shoulders below the AAA and higher teams. Which teams got better is certainly a good question.

One program is bleeding players and having teams implode. The other isn’t.

Are you boys bickering about the 2029 True Black team that got dismantled by Valley Select in the summer?

I don't know about the VLC teams but last year True Black was a rec-level Hoco A, didn't have a 2031 or 2032 team.

Doesn't seem like a good youth program to me looking at the 2029-2032 years. Doesn't look like they had a lot of teams "playing this summer".

[Anonymous]

Unhinged behavior IMO for True parents to get worked up over bragging rights for mid-100s ranked team.

[Anonymous]

No one is “unhinged”. We are just saying that True is a better option that the dumpster fire that is VLC