[quote=Anonymous]What people often miss in this discussion is that there are enough of these older kids to form 1-2 “elite” teams in any age group/region. But there aren’t enough to support a whole top tier division.
So what happens? A few teams dominate the top divisions against teams that have some, but not as many, older kids
And the lacrosse games aren’t competitive.
As a result, kids in the top half of the talent curve simply dont develop as well because they are not challenging themselves or playing competitive games. Both the winners and losers in the elite, AAAA and AAA divisions suffer.
And because of this talent gap, lacrosse continues to be a small, regional-sport. Not growing the way others are.
This is one thing soccer gets right. Age-based is the way to go if you want to grow the game and raise the bar for the sport as a whole, across the country. That only happens with ensuring competitive games for the bulk of the kids and pushing the top kids to challenge themselves by playing up, not down.
Excellent points. I vote for the age cutoff to be my kid's birthdate. All in favor?
Spoken like a true holdback apologist. Age is the way of youth athletics , but it wouldnt let select players ( mainly prep school ) play down in age and dominate.
My feeling are, if you cant change to age based, then let everyone play down a grade if on age, That way you give the parents the choice to play with the holdbacks or not. Seems fair to me. Why let holdbacks and prefirsts get a advantage others dont. Youth is about attempting to make it a somewhat even playing field or same rules for all.
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