Whether Rebels should have gone to Lehigh to play instead of DE is a matter of debate and those who argue they should have have a valid point BUT although Rebels was in a grouping of 30-31 teams the 3 teams they beat en route to finals- SJ Shamrocks, Blue Star, and NXT, are not “town teams” and all are respectable, if not quite on level of Rebels or 91, CLUB teams. All three of those teams were 2030 kids only. Blue Star and NXT have 2031 teams that played in different division. I watched the Rebels/NXT game while waiting for my sons game to start after and the game was closer than score at least in first quarter. They were obviously more disciplined and better coaches than NXT but they weren’t all that more athletic or gifted. They would have probably benefited from going to DE instead but I’m thankful they came to Lehigh so that they those of us from Philadelphia and Jersey who rarely get to see teams from LI could get an up close look and see just how far teams from this area have to go to improve to that level of play.
