Feedback on Boys Club Lacrosse summer 2019

[Anonymous]

I think there has been some very informative posts on this site for the last few weeks. I think it is also confusing when posters ask for feedback on one club and get comments that always refer back to another club usually Madlax. I think it is important with tryouts starting in August to learn how teams are shaping up between the end of HOCO season and summer tournaments. A thread on all boys clubs might be helpful. Here is my take:
List of DMV teams: Annapolis and Baltimore are NOT DMV teams
DMV Pulls from VA and MOCO area:
1. Madlax: The top talent at most ages especially 2023 and 2024. The 2023 team has 75% MD players and practices mostly at GTP. 2024 is a very strong team coached by founder. Has both A and B teams
2. Blackwolf: Used to get top gets and great college placement. Team is a bit of a mystery. Not sure about 2022 and 2023 classes.
Mostly MOCO County:
1. BLC/DCE: For the most part many Bethesda club kids move to DCE for 8-11 grade teams. Strong overall and a notch above Next Level at most age groups. Has A and B teams.
2. Next Level: Has some talented kids on A teams that feed private schools but does not get the same top kids as DCE and ML top teams. Also has B teams
3. MDX: Mostly public school coaches/players. Great for building skills not as big on college recruitment does not play top events
Frederick/Charles Co.
1. 3d: National program. Took over Lax Factory and have not seen them as much any more at the tournaments or HOCO league
2. Cannons: Draw from Charles and PG with a few into the AA Co. area
NOVA:
1. VLC seem to be the top team in VA which is not as strong not sure if they have B teams or what the involvement is with the Crabs. Good 8th grade team. A few elite players. Good college as they get older. Used to get MD kids
2. Cavalier: Seems to be the VLC B team with confident parents. Must be a good program for youth.
3. Top Caliber: Not sure about the success but seems to play in good events.
4. Evergreen: Another mystery. Great website not sure where or at what level they play.

There must be more but I hope some may find this helpful if you are new to Club Lacrosse and do not want to read the multiple posts with some questionable comments.

[Anonymous]

[Anonymous]

Madlax has a gaudy record at HoCo but it's hard to tell since they inherited the 2023's from a now defunct club with sixteen year olds and they were caught playing a roster of mostly 6th graders in a 5th grade division and got caught doing the same at a tournament last summer. Any win by them is suspect.

Blackwolf's model is dying and teams are struggling to get players.

NL and BLC are essentially even and tied for performance in HoCo. The younger teams at NL are clearly better than BLC since the Mitchell's took over NL a few years ago.

MDX is a B level club

3d folded MD operations into VA

The rest are all competing at lower levels in their leagues and tournaments or not enjoying as much success as NL, ML and BLC.

[Anonymous]

Evergreen does not play in HoCo, which is a good thing for dads who are sick of driving 90 mins each way on Sundays. Not sure who they play. They have a reputation as being not quite as good as the Cavs though.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

NL and BLC are essentially even and tied for performance in HoCo. The younger teams at NL are clearly better than BLC since the Mitchell's took over NL a few years ago.

What do you mean by the "younger" teams? BLC Blue at 2025 and 2026 are still a lot better than their NL counterparts in terms of HOCO and summer tourney invites and records. When does it shift?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

NL and BLC are essentially even and tied for performance in HoCo. The younger teams at NL are clearly better than BLC since the Mitchell's took over NL a few years ago.

What do you mean by the "younger" teams? BLC Blue at 2025 and 2026 are still a lot better than their NL counterparts in terms of HOCO and summer tourney invites and records. When does it shift?

I suppose you could say that the 2027 NL team is better (based on HoCo performance) but the BLC 2027 team did very well at the NLF a couple of weeks ago.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

NL and BLC are essentially even and tied for performance in HoCo. The younger teams at NL are clearly better than BLC since the Mitchell's took over NL a few years ago.

What do you mean by the "younger" teams? BLC Blue at 2025 and 2026 are still a lot better than their NL counterparts in terms of HOCO and summer tourney invites and records. When does it shift?

I suppose you could say that the 2027 NL team is better (based on HoCo performance) but the BLC 2027 team did very well at the NLF a couple of weeks ago.

The Madlax 2034 team is stacked. Better than NL and BLC combined. However a friend of a friend told me that have some 4 and 5 year olds on the team that reclassed. Still cheating.

[Anonymous]

Not too bad a summary, some of the rankings could be questioned but overall pretty solid information.

My thoughts:

(1) Check HoCo final standings and get the Tourney Machine App (you can see how teams are doing in the tournaments). Focus only on the grade your son will be playing in as teams above and below have no real impact (comment following will somewhat contradict this) as there is no one dominant club top to bottom in the area and there can huge variation in coaches, parents, kids, etc. This is all very simple to do and will give you a fairly good lay of the land for the grade you are looking at.
(2) Things that are making this more complicated. First, holdbacks. Because of the dominance of private school lacrosse and entry date for K there are many summer holdbacks, not a huge issue. The issue is the trend of holding back in 7th & 8th grades, this can have a pretty significant impact on team composition on 7th and 8th (and perhaps even 6th) grade teams. Not sure how to account for this in choosing a club. Second, constant tryouts. It was not that long ago that a team was picked in August and that team played together for the year, there was actually some development associated with club lacrosse. Now it is somewhat of a revolving tryout schedule: early summer, late summer, winter/fall. The reality is that if you have an athletic son with some lacrosse skills you can get a look from a club coach at any time now.
(3) If you are new to the sport the best way to get better and get a better feel for clubs is to play for one. "B" teams are not bad. No matter what anyone says there is more to the sport than winning NLF or Crabfest or any top tournament you want to name. All clubs rely on paying members for their existence so it is not hard to reach out to them and see what the process is and get your child a look. Clinics run by the clubs are also a good way to get to know coaches and clubs.
(4) It is an expensive sport. Club lacrosse will likely run north of $3k per year and in some cases closer to $6k+ with travel. There are good rec leagues, if you are not sure you want to make that kind of investment start there.
(5) Do not listen to the noise and hate on this board or BOTC. It can be an indicator of many things. If there are things that ring true take what you hear and ask real people you trust about it, this board is generally not chock full of facts and forgets the world is not black and white but some shade of grey.
(6) We have had sons who have played for elite and B teams for 3+ of the clubs you named. All have their good and not so good points, you actually have to do some work on finding the right fit. Our sons have been fortunate enough to win some leagues and tournaments over their time in youth lacrosse and I will tell you whether it was at the elite or B level it made no difference in the joy and accomplishment they felt.
(7) These thoughts are mostly directed at club 8th grade and below. As you get into high school recruiting can become important to families and understandably so. At that point if college lacrosse is a goal you need to find the highest level club where your son can get good playing time. This may end up being on a B team but better to be seen playing than ride the bench for a top team. Recruiting opportunities are obviously better at top tournaments but most of the high school age tournaments have some level of recruiting involved.
(8) Be self aware of where your child stands in terms of ability. This can always change and hard work and dedication to anything will make them better. The reality is that in our experience we have seen very few (if any) kids who are not playing at the appropriate level for their skills. I am sure they exist but in a club world driven by wins and losses this does tend to actually get it right.
(9) Finally, have fun, it is a youth sport after all. Reality is most kids will not play DI lacrosse so enjoy the moment.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

NL and BLC are essentially even and tied for performance in HoCo. The younger teams at NL are clearly better than BLC since the Mitchell's took over NL a few years ago.

What do you mean by the "younger" teams? BLC Blue at 2025 and 2026 are still a lot better than their NL counterparts in terms of HOCO and summer tourney invites and records. When does it shift?

I suppose you could say that the 2027 NL team is better (based on HoCo performance) but the BLC 2027 team did very well at the NLF a couple of weeks ago.

Take it easy Mater Dei dad. The 24's, 27's and 28's of NL all had better records. The 26 NL team should probably have been in the elite division but the 25's of BLC are clearly better. And the 2027 BLC team went 2-4 in Long Island against kids almost a year younger than most of the BLC roster.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Not too bad a summary, some of the rankings could be questioned but overall pretty solid information.

My thoughts:

(1) Check HoCo final standings and get the Tourney Machine App (you can see how teams are doing in the tournaments). Focus only on the grade your son will be playing in as teams above and below have no real impact (comment following will somewhat contradict this) as there is no one dominant club top to bottom in the area and there can huge variation in coaches, parents, kids, etc. This is all very simple to do and will give you a fairly good lay of the land for the grade you are looking at.
(2) Things that are making this more complicated. First, holdbacks. Because of the dominance of private school lacrosse and entry date for K there are many summer holdbacks, not a huge issue. The issue is the trend of holding back in 7th & 8th grades, this can have a pretty significant impact on team composition on 7th and 8th (and perhaps even 6th) grade teams. Not sure how to account for this in choosing a club. Second, constant tryouts. It was not that long ago that a team was picked in August and that team played together for the year, there was actually some development associated with club lacrosse. Now it is somewhat of a revolving tryout schedule: early summer, late summer, winter/fall. The reality is that if you have an athletic son with some lacrosse skills you can get a look from a club coach at any time now.
(3) If you are new to the sport the best way to get better and get a better feel for clubs is to play for one. "B" teams are not bad. No matter what anyone says there is more to the sport than winning NLF or Crabfest or any top tournament you want to name. All clubs rely on paying members for their existence so it is not hard to reach out to them and see what the process is and get your child a look. Clinics run by the clubs are also a good way to get to know coaches and clubs.
(4) It is an expensive sport. Club lacrosse will likely run north of $3k per year and in some cases closer to $6k+ with travel. There are good rec leagues, if you are not sure you want to make that kind of investment start there.
(5) Do not listen to the noise and hate on this board or BOTC. It can be an indicator of many things. If there are things that ring true take what you hear and ask real people you trust about it, this board is generally not chock full of facts and forgets the world is not black and white but some shade of grey.
(6) We have had sons who have played for elite and B teams for 3+ of the clubs you named. All have their good and not so good points, you actually have to do some work on finding the right fit. Our sons have been fortunate enough to win some leagues and tournaments over their time in youth lacrosse and I will tell you whether it was at the elite or B level it made no difference in the joy and accomplishment they felt.
(7) These thoughts are mostly directed at club 8th grade and below. As you get into high school recruiting can become important to families and understandably so. At that point if college lacrosse is a goal you need to find the highest level club where your son can get good playing time. This may end up being on a B team but better to be seen playing than ride the bench for a top team. Recruiting opportunities are obviously better at top tournaments but most of the high school age tournaments have some level of recruiting involved.
(8) Be self aware of where your child stands in terms of ability. This can always change and hard work and dedication to anything will make them better. The reality is that in our experience we have seen very few (if any) kids who are not playing at the appropriate level for their skills. I am sure they exist but in a club world driven by wins and losses this does tend to actually get it right.
(9) Finally, have fun, it is a youth sport after all. Reality is most kids will not play DI lacrosse so enjoy the moment.

+1

[Anonymous]

"3d folded MD operations into VA"

I thought it was the other way around. Did many LaxFactory kids stay with 3d? Lax Factory I thought was an up and coming program with good potential. The 2022 team was solid.

[Anonymous]

Have a rising senior this year. Late start to lax but recruited to private to play and is a D1 recruit (not quite top level) and certainly a very solid D3 recruit. Plays for one of the big 3 club teams mentioned for DC area. DS has not attended individual showcases but did do UnderArmour a few years, a few prospect days, visited a few schools by invites.

My take is that some clubs by junior year run games not to win but to make sure every player has an opportunity to be seen by the coaches at these tournaments which is what you as a parent should want. A club's goal is to get as many of their team playing lax in college as possible if that's what the kid wants.

Also, with the recruiting change, this year it appears that the very top players - say 125 or so go recruited early on - many of them were probably committed at a younger age and grandfathered in. There are a large number of 2020s who are still being watched and will visit schools this summer and fall. That's a big change from the previous way.

There are kids whose parents are signing them up for every thing - showcases, prospect days and so on plus club play. We see signs of burnout and injuries with most of those kids. The effort required at the college level is huge and I don't know that these kids will ultimately keep up their love of the game. Love of the game by the player is all a family should really care about ultimately. While lax may get a player a bump to a bit more competitive college, it may not. It's really a cr@pshoot waiting to see which colleges are interested although players can reach out to whomever.

Third - make sure your player has time and energy to actually send out emails and fill out player questionnaires by junior year. While coaches may keep an extra eye on younger player teams who win major tournaments, they are very wishy-washy until the end unless your player is a 5 star recruit. Also they switch jobs constantly. Your player needs to contact the asst coach for their position, copy the head coach and have a good video to send.

From what we've seen, you want your player to peak with club play by sophomore through junior summer. That's when they'll really get noticed. Do some individual showcases then and prospect day at any colleges they're obsessed with - ours is obsessed with none and many boys aren't really so no worries there - just makes it interesting but in the long run possibly less disappointing. Better to focus on weightlifting as appropriate, footwork, speed, ground balls and catching/wall ball daily before then. Lax IQ and great field vision/anticipation/teamwork is also important.

Finally, don't let your kid forget that lax is about a team, not ball hogs, because coaches don't really want ball hogs. They much prefer a great shooter who also isn't afraid to assist.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:"3d folded MD operations into VA"

I thought it was the other way around. Did many LaxFactory kids stay with 3d? Lax Factory I thought was an up and coming program with good potential. The 2022 team was solid.

Whatever way you want to phrase it. The managers are the same for both MD and VA but it does look like they are trying to have teams for both sides of the river. They are still a very B club in this region but they may have great clinics and not teams.

[Anonymous]

3d VA has completely folded. This thread is doomed because each post may have some accuracies as well as inaccuracies. No way to know.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Have a rising senior this year. Late start to lax but recruited to private to play and is a D1 recruit (not quite top level) and certainly a very solid D3 recruit. Plays for one of the big 3 club teams mentioned for DC area. DS has not attended individual showcases but did do UnderArmour a few years, a few prospect days, visited a few schools by invites.

My take is that some clubs by junior year run games not to win but to make sure every player has an opportunity to be seen by the coaches at these tournaments which is what you as a parent should want. A club's goal is to get as many of their team playing lax in college as possible if that's what the kid wants.

Also, with the recruiting change, this year it appears that the very top players - say 125 or so go recruited early on - many of them were probably committed at a younger age and grandfathered in. There are a large number of 2020s who are still being watched and will visit schools this summer and fall. That's a big change from the previous way.

There are kids whose parents are signing them up for every thing - showcases, prospect days and so on plus club play. We see signs of burnout and injuries with most of those kids. The effort required at the college level is huge and I don't know that these kids will ultimately keep up their love of the game. Love of the game by the player is all a family should really care about ultimately. While lax may get a player a bump to a bit more competitive college, it may not. It's really a cr@pshoot waiting to see which colleges are interested although players can reach out to whomever.

Third - make sure your player has time and energy to actually send out emails and fill out player questionnaires by junior year. While coaches may keep an extra eye on younger player teams who win major tournaments, they are very wishy-washy until the end unless your player is a 5 star recruit. Also they switch jobs constantly. Your player needs to contact the asst coach for their position, copy the head coach and have a good video to send.

From what we've seen, you want your player to peak with club play by sophomore through junior summer. That's when they'll really get noticed. Do some individual showcases then and prospect day at any colleges they're obsessed with - ours is obsessed with none and many boys aren't really so no worries there - just makes it interesting but in the long run possibly less disappointing. Better to focus on weightlifting as appropriate, footwork, speed, ground balls and catching/wall ball daily before then. Lax IQ and great field vision/anticipation/teamwork is also important.

Finally, don't let your kid forget that lax is about a team, not ball hogs, because coaches don't really want ball hogs. They much prefer a great shooter who also isn't afraid to assist.

As a middle school lax parent, I really appreciated the thoughtful tone of this overview.