California parent here. Just wanted to share update on American Select as we had our tryouts last weekend. Stanford players were the evaluators. Coaches for teams were NOT present. Seems about as unbiased as you can get. Team rosters will be made public later this week I am told.
So a bunch of 22 players figured out the best players from the tryout and no complaints ? Please have them do all the tryouts and all will agree with the picks for once.
Unfortunately, parents will always complain. Many parents are not able to honestly assess their child’s abilities. September 1 is approaching and the college coaches will make their opinions known. The recruiting process generally lets players and parents know just where the player stands in relation to others. Just encourage your daughter to work hard and have fun. There is a good fit for everyone, help your daughter find it.
There is a flip side to the anti-parent (parents will always complain) narrative. There are girls who go through this whole process, unproclaimed by politics and not pushed by club coaches or directors. Girls who just didn’t fit the narrative that a coach or director deemed “elite”. This is especially true when you enter parent coaches in the mix, or have directors pushing favors (and yes that definitely happens). Yet that same player garners the utmost interest among college coaches come recruiting years. Yes it happens, my daughter never received the praise or push that a few seemed to get on the elite team, but I can tell you, she received much more attention than nearly all those girls pushed by the club, come recruiting time. Truth is, a club had one person making a choice on a player, a single opinion. One opinion really should not make make or break a player, but sadly it has too much influence in travel lacrosse. The truth comes out during recruiting, when a player, not valued by the travel team coach/director, literally blows away the rest of the team with college coach interest during recruiting, from elite teams and mind blowing scholarship offers. This is a shout out to parents deemed as complainers. Of course the parents of the acclaimed kids will always call out poo-poo. Travel lacrosse is a dirty, sleezy necessity, but not all kids who are not deemed “elite” by the coach or director are doomed. Sadly (1) single travel coach with an agenda, can largely influence a girl’s college career or path based upon that single opinion, and that opinion may be serious wrong. Hopefully you can battle through and catch the opinion of the 350 D1coaches instead. I feel sad because I know it is hard to overcome, very luckily my daughter did! A light of hope for you who know there are definitely politics involved.
