Reply to 2026 Private School Boys Lacrosse Commentary, Scores, and Updates

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]GP just brought in a mid year junior pole from Canada. He'll be a year older than the normal reclass players in that class. If people thought they were bad under Urick, wait til they see what Hilgartner does. [/quote]

another example of why local Catholic lacrosse families aren't looking as strongly as they once did at Prep. The more GP goes down the boarding route to recruit all blue-chip recruits, the more it will turn off local families. [/quote]

I just love how hypocritical GP parents are. On the one hand they pin their hopes on Hilgartner who will cast a wide net just like the other teams are doing while at the same time hating on boarders. If DMV lacrosse was all that it thinks it is. Hilgy would just recruit within the beltway![/quote]

It's always great at GP until it's your kid getting replaced. All of sudden it's not so fun at CCC. [/quote]

Very true.

Prep Dads will have a hard time accepting the fact Hilgy could care less if MD families come to GP when he is recruiting blue chip recruits from CA or FL and TX.

Once the local kids are pushed to the bench, all hell will break out at GP.

I’ve said this for a while, if you take away Preps boarders on their football and hoops and lax teams, they would be very sub par.

[/quote]

It’s already happening, but let me tie a couple of posts on this thread together to provide a more complete picture of what GP is up against and for that matter many other schools.

1. The Hilgartner Situation: First, GP didn’t have any real options other than Hilgartner. Is he a good coach? Definitely but not a great one. The proof is that McDonough didn’t try to keep him. People invest in value and quite simply price versus performance wasn’t clearly apparent to McDonough leadership.  McDonough throws a ton of money at its lacrosse program so it’s interesting as to why they didn’t try to maintain the relationship. Hilgartner was brought in to resurrect a program. Strong performance equals strong donations from alums which translates into a growing endowment. Endowments are what pay for facilities and programs. Not tuition. Hilgartner will cast a wide net for talent and as stated above that will displace locals. For those who subscribe to posts on this forum saying that GP needs return to the GP of the 90’s, pull your heads out of the sand traps at CCC. GP Lacrosse is going to follow the same model as the other teams like football and basketball. Quite frankly, if those players were available within the belt way Hilgartner’s work would be easy. Competition for quality students is high within the DMV. The implosion of GP Lacrosse in specific has given families permission to look at other schools than GP where the value proposition might be more interesting.

2. GP Boarding: First of all, GP is not a boarding school. It is a day school that incidentally lets 20% of its students spend the night. That is a much different experience than Lawrenceville, Choate, Taft, or Andover. The pervasive “locals only” attitude is a real turn off. Kids talk and from what I hear the dorm experience leaves a lot to be desired. Locals antipathy towards boarders is manifest everywhere certainly on this forum so there is going to be tension between the landed gentry and an administration/coaching staff that has divergent ideas regarding the direction for the program. Families are looking for value and there was a great post comparing the tuition and room/board prices of the various elite boarding school. Turns out GP was one of the most expensive. That creates a real recruiting problem for Hilgartner and GP.

Take this example, my kid is a strong student with a solid reputation in lacrosse and we live in Baltimore. It’s too far to commute. He has to board. I do some research and find out other schools aren’t more expensive, have better academics, consistently ranked higher in lacrosse, and are feeders to the IVY league and other top universities. I don’t even have to look far from home. Boys Latin had more IVY League commits than GP this year. That says a lot. Then, I come to site like this where I see GP parents denigrating boarders and transfers. I’m not letting my kid be subjected to that treatment even to the point of singling. The answer is a clear one.

Hilgartner has taken on a monumental task. Whatever he’s getting paid he is going to earn every penny. I just don’t think nat this stage of his career he is up to it.[/quote]

Taking advantage of an opportunity to provide an alternative perspective on a few items in your post about Prep.

1. Prep coaching search - it's not accurate to suggest they had no other options.  They had a couple of good candidates they could have potentially hired if Hilgartner hadn't said yes.  It can be argued that the school did a poor job of timing their move away from Urick (the reality is that was pushed heavily by alums more so than the administration and it took a while for the ball to start rolling downhill). Waiting until summer probably altered the approach a bit, but they still had options. Having not scoured DCUM for all posts related to this topic, I can't unequivocally say you're wrong, but it seems like a lot of the talk of Prep parents being upset or wanting things to go back to how they were in the 90's is coming from people outside of the Prep community in many instances sharing "what they've heard".  There are comments on these boards about drama with past, current and future parents at every school and it has to be recognized that some of it's driven by people who aren't associated with those schools either sharing what they hear or wanting what they're saying to be true.

2. Prep's old dorms were antiquated which may have made the boarding experience less attractive for students, however, despite that, the school didn't have an issue attracting boarders.  Historically, Prep has always had a larger international boarder population versus US boarders.  There are a lot of families from Asia and South America that have a tradition of sending their sons to Prep for a Jesuit education (the new dorm was only made possible b/c of a very large gift from a family from Asia who had multiple generations attend the school). The new dorm has not only transformed the living experience for the boarders but it has also serves to better integrate the whole day student / resident student experience.  I'm not sure how that translates to the dorm experience leaving a "lot to be desired" but having sons who went to the school, this is accurate (doesn't mean the situation is perfect, or that no Prep boarder is unhappy, but it's a stretch to say it's undesirable).

In terms of tuition, it has to be said that spending $70K plus on HS is a lot of money and good for those that can afford it (or whose kid has earned assistance), but using your list of other boarding schools + adding Deerfield b/c it has become a popular boarding destination for lacrosse players in this area, Prep boarding tuition sits right in the middle of that list in terms of boarder tuition.

3. Don't know much about Boys Latin - sure it's a great school that sends kids to fantastic colleges and know there is a rich lacrosse history there.  Doing a quick look at their lacrosse instagram page and IL, I don't see the commits' to IVY league schools for 24, 25 or 26 (perhaps there are 27'S that just aren't posted yet). That doesn't mean it's not true, but BL isn't posting it and it's not reflected elsewhere.  I believe it's accurate that Prep currently has 2 starting attack at Princeton with a 26 and a 27 committed to go there plus a 27 commit to Brown (I'm not sharing other commits to schools like Hopkins b/c your comment was limited to the IVYs).  Even if other schools are sending more kids to the IVY's for lacrosse, that's not a bad track record for Prep.

There's no arguing Prep's lacrosse was going in the wrong direction the last few years and alums & parents weren't happy (not sure that would be different at any other school).  They had a fantastic team a few years back b/c they had a group of great seniors with some strong underclassmen... once that class graduated, the team failed to repeat that success. Small part due to talent drop, large part due to coaching - it happens, just look at the comments on this board right now about Dematha and Gonzaga coaches.  Talent hides a lot and when it graduates and the teams don't do as well, parents are quick to become unhappy and parents from competing schools are quick to pile on and escalate - it's what makes DCUM so popular!

Lastly, it's fair to comment on Prep parents b/c a number have earned that, but it's not as if Gonzaga, Landon, St. Johns, Boys Latin, McDonough, etc.. don't also have some parents that fall into the same category. No school can escape the unfortunate sports parents.  Every once in a while, there's a great class of kids and parents that can set a tone and minimize the volume of the undesirables, but it's awfully hard to avoid it on the regular.  So yes, it may be true that some Prep parent, whether it's at CCC or Millies or McDonalds, might be grumbling about something, but no one can say that the same isn't true of the other schools parents as well, so it's a little disingenuous when that is used against Prep like it's unique.

Perhaps we let this season go deeper than 3 games (all wins btw) before deeming the Hilgartner experiment a failure and Prep an unattractive destination for any and all local lacrosse talent moving forward.        [/quote]

Very well said, and I agree 100%.[/quote]

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