Let's set some facts:

1. Madlax cheated. HOCO rules explicitly say everyone on a team in a certain grade division must all be students in that grade. If the refs had misinterpreted the rule, the league would have corrected them and did not.

2. The Madlax 2025/2026 B team was not very good and played in the 2026 A division (second to worse in 2026). They had a few 2025s on the team. On a team that bad in a division that bad, having older kids on the team is a big difference maker.

3. Saying "Everyone does it and gets away with it" is pathetic

4. If you are putting your 1st grader on a club team, you need your head examined.

Appreciate the feedback. Son was asked to try out for a 2nd grade team, although he will be in 1st grade next year (Sept birthday), with the idea that he play for the same team two years in a row. Agree on not over doing it. I think it is a balance of accretive coaching versus being too much to handle. Will preview and make a decision. If I get a whiff of hesitation, agree that rec is the way to go.

Just some reality for people reading this:

1. There are five divisions in the HOCO league this was in the second to lowest division. The players were most likely not "ringers" if they play down and play in the lowest division and still the team was not the best in that division.
2. 5th grade is NOT middle school.
3. It only get's worse. Look at the Madlax 8th grade team not one parent will deny that they have kids 15 and maybe 16. The age difference is greater at that level.
4. HOCO league competition committee has ties to all the clubs that all have older players on the roster. It is so normal I am not sure that the ML people even thought it was against the rules.
5. USL could fix this if they wanted to.
6. If you son is 6 I would recommend just playing Rec ball and other sports. If you start club at 6 they will be ready to quit by HS.

Just my opinion

The simple fix is to ask for a roster check before playing each game (basically a $50 tax) or maybe HoCo can realize that integrity matters and install this as mandatory before play.

In any event, the individuals most cheated in this scenario were the legitimate age kids that were displaced with the ringers. IMO the practice of optimizing teams, whether in a legal or illegal manner (playing better or older kids down, respectively), is extremely destructive to player development. Kids develop differently and I'm sure many of us knew a kid that grew 6+ inches in high school and played DI lacrosse. However, this situation is less possible if the same late-blooming player isn't afforded the opportunity to develop fundamentals in middle school because of optimizing teams by moving kids around. In fairness, ML discloses that its rosters are fluid, so, setting aside whether fluidity is legal, you have to ask yourself whether that philosophy is something you think is best for your child.

I'm the process of choosing a club for my 6 year old son and, at least for me, commitment to player development is critically important. I'm sure all clubs do some roster gerrymandering, but I'm not comfortable with it being a core philosophy.

WRONG! Read the totality of the HoCo rules -

"The Conference follows a grade-based system based on the player’s current grade level...and "Any team using an ineligible player shall automatically forfeit each game in which the player participated. If a team uses
a player under an assumed name, that team shall be suspended from the league. Each game played with that player and all scheduled games not played shall be forfeited to the opponents"

So Madlax should have forfeited all of its games until they proved that they didnt cheat all season. but more importantly, tts either graded based or DoB - not both, and the roster is just one last check to make sure that no one is brazen enough to cheat in a kids ms game.

But madlax cheated, and got busted again. Maybe they learn from it this time.

Anonymous wrote:But here's the weird part about this whole cheating thing, HoCo had to know about it. This very same MadLax team was DQed from the Hershey Tournament last summer for the same thing. Why do tournaments and leagues pit up with this? Or more importantly why do the madlax families?

Because it is NOT cheating according to the HOCO rules. The only rule is that they must submit a roster in advance. It would only be cheating if the players in question were NOT only the original roster that was submitted. A 2026 player could be 15 for all HOCO league cares as long as the player was on the roster. There are other local DMV area teams that used guest players not on the roster and were not caught.

But here's the weird part about this whole cheating thing, HoCo had to know about it. This very same MadLax team was DQed from the Hershey Tournament last summer for the same thing. Why do tournaments and leagues pit up with this? Or more importantly why do the madlax families?

Today Madlax tweeted good luck to specific Madlax alums on the UVA men's team. Left out was the "ungrateful quitter" who apparently did just fine leaving Madlax in 8th grade despite several unhinged emails about this derailing his college future, he played lax in HS and for another local club team and is now part of the 2019 National Men's Lacrosse Championship team. Congrats to all athletes who pursue their own path to success and thanks to the love, patience and support of their parents and friends.

Madlax parents deserve blame as well. They knew that playing in a 2026 division wasn't ethical, yet they allowed their sons to play in that division.

But of course Madlax deserves blame and should get some type of penalty if HOCO has any legitimacy.

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Anonymous wrote:Yeah no way they get banned. Not that it wouldn’t be a just result, but won’t happen.

Why not? At least suspend or ban the coach of the team.

For what?

MadLax entered a team in the 2026 A division and played the season with a number of 2025 kids. They played BLC in the playoffs, won and BLC immediately filed a protest (it must be done within 15 minutes of the game). The officials asked a number of kids on MadLax what grade they were in and the kids responded by saying they were in 6th grade. MadLax had to forfeit and the score shows up as a 1-0 victory for BLC.

So the 5th graders self identified as 6th graders. Time to move on. This happens with all divisions of HOCO. Get used to it. The funny thing is that it happened in the "A" division which is really B- I but more blame on the Bethesda coach. If you knew this, you knew it long before this game, you knew it earlier in the season. Would they file a protest if they won? BLC is the shameful club here To confront a sixth grader and make him feel like he did something wrong is the real problem. THE PLAYER DID NOTHING WRONG! The coaches did. HOCO league let's kids two-three years older play on teams and knows about this. They have the birth dates. Any parent of any club knows this. If you wait until AFTER the game to address this, that coach is the problem in this story. I am not a Madlax parent and only know what I have read on these posts. It sounds like a coach called out something he knew about before the game. The refs should NOT have involved the players. File a protest later. The officials should not be asking the kids.

Bullshit. They're not stupid. They know what the rules are. They know they're cheating.

READING IS FUNDAMENTAL - 6th GRADERS WERE PURPORTED BY MADLAX as 5TH GRADERS - while players are allowed to play up, they are not allowed to play down.. To clarify, Hoco is a grade based league while NVYLL is an age-based league. Unlike a summer tourny, Hoco league has 5 divisions (B, A, AA, AAA, Elite) for 2025 6th graders. Madlax DMV should not be fielding a team w/ some 6th graders in a 5th grade A division - no matter how bad they think their team is. BLC did nothing wrong by protesting - the refs are given the discretion to make sure coaches and players are following Hoco rules.

Do you think the kids who are normally on 2025 (in 6th grade) did not know that they were being told to play with a 2026 (6th grade) team, and that this was wrong? Of course they knew. To repeat: these kids are not stupid.

Yes the kids all knew they were a mixed 5th/6th grade team. Their parents, coaches and obviously Madlax knew that this team had been entered into 2026 single A division. Reading PP's citing of Hoco rules - technically this team should have forfeited all 7 regular season games (w/ no playoff game) instead of losing only 1 game and making the playoffs at the #2 seed. Don't think any kid, parent, coach or Madlax cared really that much as they got to play and won most their games. The usual defense is "everyone does it" and "you're just mad we won". Apparently, not everyone cheats and the kids/parents now understand they haven't won anything. Madlax still has DMV's cash flow while marketing the success of their Capital teams.

typo 2026 5th grade not 6th grade

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Anonymous wrote:Yeah no way they get banned. Not that it wouldn’t be a just result, but won’t happen.

Why not? At least suspend or ban the coach of the team.

For what?

MadLax entered a team in the 2026 A division and played the season with a number of 2025 kids. They played BLC in the playoffs, won and BLC immediately filed a protest (it must be done within 15 minutes of the game). The officials asked a number of kids on MadLax what grade they were in and the kids responded by saying they were in 6th grade. MadLax had to forfeit and the score shows up as a 1-0 victory for BLC.

So the 5th graders self identified as 6th graders. Time to move on. This happens with all divisions of HOCO. Get used to it. The funny thing is that it happened in the "A" division which is really B- I but more blame on the Bethesda coach. If you knew this, you knew it long before this game, you knew it earlier in the season. Would they file a protest if they won? BLC is the shameful club here To confront a sixth grader and make him feel like he did something wrong is the real problem. THE PLAYER DID NOTHING WRONG! The coaches did. HOCO league let's kids two-three years older play on teams and knows about this. They have the birth dates. Any parent of any club knows this. If you wait until AFTER the game to address this, that coach is the problem in this story. I am not a Madlax parent and only know what I have read on these posts. It sounds like a coach called out something he knew about before the game. The refs should NOT have involved the players. File a protest later. The officials should not be asking the kids.

Bullshit. They're not stupid. They know what the rules are. They know they're cheating.

READING IS FUNDAMENTAL - 6th GRADERS WERE PURPORTED BY MADLAX as 5TH GRADERS - while players are allowed to play up, they are not allowed to play down.. To clarify, Hoco is a grade based league while NVYLL is an age-based league. Unlike a summer tourny, Hoco league has 5 divisions (B, A, AA, AAA, Elite) for 2025 6th graders. Madlax DMV should not be fielding a team w/ some 6th graders in a 5th grade A division - no matter how bad they think their team is. BLC did nothing wrong by protesting - the refs are given the discretion to make sure coaches and players are following Hoco rules.

Do you think the kids who are normally on 2025 (in 6th grade) did not know that they were being told to play with a 2026 (6th grade) team, and that this was wrong? Of course they knew. To repeat: these kids are not stupid.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yeah no way they get banned. Not that it wouldn’t be a just result, but won’t happen.

Why not? At least suspend or ban the coach of the team.

For what?

MadLax entered a team in the 2026 A division and played the season with a number of 2025 kids. They played BLC in the playoffs, won and BLC immediately filed a protest (it must be done within 15 minutes of the game). The officials asked a number of kids on MadLax what grade they were in and the kids responded by saying they were in 6th grade. MadLax had to forfeit and the score shows up as a 1-0 victory for BLC.

So the 5th graders self identified as 6th graders. Time to move on. This happens with all divisions of HOCO. Get used to it. The funny thing is that it happened in the "A" division which is really B- I but more blame on the Bethesda coach. If you knew this, you knew it long before this game, you knew it earlier in the season. Would they file a protest if they won? BLC is the shameful club here To confront a sixth grader and make him feel like he did something wrong is the real problem. THE PLAYER DID NOTHING WRONG! The coaches did. HOCO league let's kids two-three years older play on teams and knows about this. They have the birth dates. Any parent of any club knows this. If you wait until AFTER the game to address this, that coach is the problem in this story. I am not a Madlax parent and only know what I have read on these posts. It sounds like a coach called out something he knew about before the game. The refs should NOT have involved the players. File a protest later. The officials should not be asking the kids.

1. No need to lie. You are a Madlax parent.

2. "Time to move on". Yes, you are a Madlax parent.

3. Madlax cheated and Bethesda is the "shameful club"? LOL.

4. You are mad because Bethesda called them out after the game (which is the protocol to protest a game)? That is like being upset that your friends were arrested right after a bank robbery, crying that the police should have arrested them BEFORE the robbery.

You are a buffoon. Sad that Madlax cheated and embarrassed those kids.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I finally got it. You are the madlax hater and you ste keeping the thread alive by defending and blaming. Brilliant

Perhaps you miss the point - Madlax DMV cheated by playing older grade kids in 2026 A division, was caught cheating by the opposing coach, was verified cheating by Hoco refs and was disqualified from further league play by the Hoco rec league. Please ask about this in the upcoming CASE camp - is cheating a core value to character and success?

CASE=Cabell Add's Serious Equity to his bank account

Anonymous wrote:I finally got it. You are the madlax hater and you ste keeping the thread alive by defending and blaming. Brilliant

Perhaps you miss the point - Madlax DMV cheated by playing older grade kids in 2026 A division, was caught cheating by the opposing coach, was verified cheating by Hoco refs and was disqualified from further league play by the Hoco rec league. Please ask about this in the upcoming CASE camp - is cheating a core value to character and success?