Back of THE CAGE Forums NORTHEAST LACROSSE BOTC MAIN FORUM Bypassing Middle School Lax for Club Team

From what I understand in Soccer these days, the trend is for the best players to bypass your school teams in favor of your club team. I guess the thinking is playing with the best players and having more productive training will improve accelerate a players development and thus increase their opportunities to play in the future.
Will lacrosse go in this direction? As anyone who's child plays on a competitive club team can attest. Going from club back to middle school sure seems like a waste of time for the best kids. These middle school coaches are trying to teach 35-40 kids, which creates a tremendous amount of standing around, not to mention districts and the state being more interested in participation % than competition.
If some of these club teams or private coaches had a quality team 4-5x a week for 1.5- 2 hours can you imagine how fast they would progress?
I'm sure this has been discussed within the community and I am now starting to wonder if club/ private lacrosse would be more productive than the public schools programs.

From what I understand in Soccer these days, the trend is for the best players to bypass your school teams in favor of your club team. I guess the thinking is playing with the best players and having more productive training will improve accelerate a players development and thus increase their opportunities to play in the future.
Will lacrosse go in this direction? As anyone who's child plays on a competitive club team can attest. Going from club back to middle school sure seems like a waste of time for the best kids. These middle school coaches are trying to teach 35-40 kids, which creates a tremendous amount of standing around, not to mention districts and the state being more interested in participation % than competition.
If some of these club teams or private coaches had a quality team 4-5x a week for 1.5- 2 hours can you imagine how fast they would progress?
I'm sure this has been discussed within the community and I am now starting to wonder if club/ private lacrosse would be more productive than the public schools programs.

From what I understand in Soccer these days, the trend is for the best players to bypass your school teams in favor of your club team. I guess the thinking is playing with the best players and having more productive training will improve accelerate a players development and thus increase their opportunities to play in the future.
Will lacrosse go in this direction? As anyone who's child plays on a competitive club team can attest. Going from club back to middle school sure seems like a waste of time for the best kids. These middle school coaches are trying to teach 35-40 kids, which creates a tremendous amount of standing around, not to mention districts and the state being more interested in participation % than competition.
If some of these club teams or private coaches had a quality team 4-5x a week for 1.5- 2 hours can you imagine how fast they would progress?
I'm sure this has been discussed within the community and I am now starting to wonder if club/ private lacrosse would be more productive than the public schools programs.

From what I understand in Soccer these days, the trend is for the best players to bypass your school teams in favor of your club team. I guess the thinking is playing with the best players and having more productive training will improve accelerate a players development and thus increase their opportunities to play in the future.
Will lacrosse go in this direction? As anyone who's child plays on a competitive club team can attest. Going from club back to middle school sure seems like a waste of time for the best kids. These middle school coaches are trying to teach 35-40 kids, which creates a tremendous amount of standing around, not to mention districts and the state being more interested in participation % than competition.
If some of these club teams or private coaches had a quality team 4-5x a week for 1.5- 2 hours can you imagine how fast they would progress?
I'm sure this has been discussed within the community and I am now starting to wonder if club/ private lacrosse would be more productive than the public schools programs.

If the current trend continues, it seems likely that the best players will forgo middle schools teams for club teams. Perhaps it will even extend to high school teams. My kid plays for a good club team and I think this trend is really unfortunate. High school lacrosse were some of my best memories. I really wish everyone would step back and let the kids be kids and enjoy their middle school and high school teams playing alongside their friends from their towns in front of local student. Don't mean to get on a soapbox. These are just my humble opinions.

I don't know that most school districts pull up from the middle school teams. I know it happens, but I think that it is more the exception than the rule. I have seen an exceptional 8th grader start, and do well, but it is rarely on a really competitive team (ie: Farmingdale or Garden City... just to name a few). I have also seen that same girl play age appropriate club and not score a goal. My daughters school dist does not allow 8th grader to play up in the High School unless that sport is not offered in the middle school.

I suppose there are very weak school teams out there, but where I live there is a select team for 7th and a select team for 8th, and then a combined 7/8th team for the next players down. Anyone taking their son off the select grade team -- with 4 or 5 practices a week + games, all of which are already paid for by your taxes -- just to play with maybe one or two "better" players on a club and pay out the nose for that privilege -- would be viewed as insane.

And considering the middle school program is the pipeline to the high school team, pulling him could have a negative impact on his future prospects within that system.

I also believe the club programs will lose ground even for the summer ... each year another group of school district coaches form "school"/town summer programs, and there has been movement off the club teams on to those town select squads. Parents are tiring of the high club fees, and the summer programs being run by the local school coaches are generally cheaper (not always, but far from the most expensive). This trend will continue as local coaches will continue jumping on the summer fees bandwagon, and parents will want to make those connections.