US Lacrosse Community Forum Forums MID-ATLANTIC LACROSSE MARYLAND FORUM Boys 2028 Grads - Mid Atlantic Region

Millon looks like a good tournament this weekend. Heavy on Hoco teams with good squads like Team91Ga and Freedom also there. Freedom, Hawks, FCAMd and Next Level are an uneducated guess as favorites in their brackets. Any thoughts on matchups and are there other tournaments to keep an eye on?

Are you insane? DCE 27 black record is 2-22 with 99 GF and 227 GA. They are demolished in almost every game (their record is available on usclub lax)

Most of the top kids seem to be headed to MCD, CHC, STM and BL.

As usual.

gonzaga bullis landon PREP??

How many guest players will Crabs have playing?

All the 27s that’s parents didn’t think they played well this year

Why ask? Don’t these kids have 2 years before they get to high school?

Lots of new faces at Crabs practice tonight. I guess we are not waiting for tryouts.

Preds, FCA, 91….any keepers?

What not Gilman? No one in their right mind should ever play for that fool coach. Hopefully he will be let go very soon or else the program should move to B or C conference.

Sorry your son didn’t get more playing time.

Hearing Crabs has had a lot of players from other teams at their practices...basically a try-out and heard team will be decided before the actual try-out. My guess is they already know who they are cutting on existing team knowing they have 2027s and out of state kids coming in. What's the best option for a fair try-out/look in Baltimore/Southern PA area.

Most teams will accommodate a guest player at practice as it's a much easier way to see where a kid would potentially fit in. That doesn't mean kids aren't getting a fair look at the official tryout. No coach would ever be unwilling to add a new face at tryout if they thought they'd upgrade their team. That is 100% a parents excuse when their kid doesn't make a team. The fact is that a lot of kids are really similar in skill and ability and you need to be a clear upgrade or have a much higher ceiling to displace a current player.

Crabs is 🚮. Their practices are 🚮. Their parents are 🚮 and the director is a piece of 💩 who has families cheat the system to win. Run from the yellow helmet. Enjoy the club experience you pay thousands for instead of wondering day to day if the new kid who shows up at your practice is going to take your kids spot. Much better atmospheres out there. You don’t need Crabs to play D1 college lacrosse.

Why don’t you just arrange to have your kid go to practice and get looked at then?

90% of this is 100% true lol.

I question the functionality of tryouts, especially with "groups of kids/coaches" moving around, and holdbacks of course, as the (actual 2028s) enter 8th grade. Boys PA tryouts and girls MD tryouts started this month, and now the average tryout date is July 15-17, which is in the middle of lax camp and family vacation season. It's bizarre, and I think it's finally highlighting the fact that tryouts are really just a high value workout OR a money maker for the clubs, whichever viewpoint you take. They certainly aren't focused on identifying skill and talent.....because so many kids don't even show up.

I'll spare you the mathematical breakdown but on a typical 2028 elite team next month (excluding 91, who will probably strongly load up on elite club 3rd line players), about 5-8 spots on the entire roster will be evaluated during the actual tryouts. Do not delude your son into thinking he's only trying out against the kids who showed up for tryouts. Whether you are talking B-level ball, AA, Elite, etc. And do not let the coaches convince you that's the case, either.

This is 100 percent true. Most clubs are not displacing a long-time player from the team unless the new kid, either at a practice or a tryout is way better than a current player. If your kid simply fits in with the rest of the talent, you will not get on the team. Your kid needs to be the new top at his position and be that by a bit. And, at the "elite" level teams, that is exceptionally difficult to do.

The reality is you are always trying out of your kid plays in HoCo. The coaches from the opposing teams know who the good players on the other teams are.

That’s how some kids seem to automatically have spots.

If your son is trying to jump up to elite from a lower division they will just need to stand out significantly.

Happens for a handful of kids each summer.

My older son has gotten offers after tryouts from multiple elite teams without any previous interaction with the coaches. It's not the most common path to an elite team but to say that's not the focus of tryouts is absurd. Coaches don't care if their current team goes to tryouts, they know what they have already. They just want enough to show up to compare against any new faces.

With that said, tryouts are never fair. There is a wide spectrum of advantages that some kids get for reasons you mentioned and many others. Be honest with your kids and tell them that they have to stand out to even have a chance. Being just as good is not going to be enough usually. This is true for many things in life - might as well get used to it.

s long as we can stop talking about 91 Venom. They just got boat raced by Eclipse 7-1. Somehow they’ve never fallen out of the top 5, despite losing more often than not when they play top 10 teams. See: Eclipse, Hawks, Madlax, 2Way
They’re a good team but it’s time these silly rankings rank them appropriately. 10-20.

Eclipse didn’t look the same in the qualifiers. Just saying.

Previous poster wasn’t saying anything about Eclipse. Just pointing out that 91 Venom is always over-ranked, by a lot.

🚫💩🕵️‍♂️

No idea what these emoji’s translate into, other than 91 Venom is the most overrated team in America?

Heard 91 venom was missing kids due to injuries, but looks like they had a rough weekend. - not a 91 dad

Looks like the Hawks had their wings clipped by FCA yesterday. Love it.

Or maybe they were playing football? They should have borrowed some Madlax Monuments

While playing the "attacking kids" card sounds fun, you are missing the point. He's not attacking the kids - he's calling out the parents. Middle school kids don't just get to decide to reclass, parents do that for them. He's specifically calling out the parents and highlighting how all of the "just hit the wall" crowd are the actual hypocrites for calling the on-age parents "soft and weak" for saying something about the older kids playing down. The irony, of course is that the ONLY soft ones here are the parents who are reclassing their kids because they couldn't hack it with the kids their own age (BTW- I bet the could but mom/dad didn't think so). So, while "attacking kids" is a wonderful narrative for the reclass parents to try and deflect the conversation to, this guy is actually attacking the parents and calling you out 1 by 1.

Was at Tri-star this weekend. 91 Venom got rocked. Don't know if they are missing kids or not but they did not look as strong as they usually do. One caveat is that Venom might be ALL on age due to WS this year. I live on the island and that's really all they talk about so we will see.

Of the teams I saw I rank them this way:

3D NE
2Way (didn't make they top 8 playoff but that was due to pool)
Express North (had a run to the championship game)
Laxachusetts
LI Express
BBL Black
Sweetlax Upstate
4 Leaf
Venom

Hawks better than the bunch, not sure where FCA, ML etc fall.

What happened to the Crabs? Seems like they are below average this year.

here is a reality check, like it or not. under the current rules there are three types of kids on elite 2028 teams: (1) Holdbacks; (2) on-age kids of exceptional size, athleticism and ability, many of whom hit puberty early, who can keep up with the holdbacks; and, (3) on age kids who are solid players, but are falling behind the kids in the first two buckets. If your son is in the third category, you are not doing him any favors by keeping him where he is and harboring resentment toward the holdbacks (kids or parents), and constantly complaining about how unfair the rules are. Find a team/division that is the right fit for your son, and both he and you will be happier.

Don’t disagree about the 3 types of 2028 kids. This is spot on. And completely agree about finding a program level that fits your kid - NOTHING is more important than this in fact. These are developmental years, development matters.

However, you aren’t going to convince me that the holdback thing is good or fair. I know, life isn’t fair…but n my opinion 7th grade lacrosse should at least TRY to be fair. In HS, all bets are off, middle school is different.

You all do realize that once your kid is in high school, he will be playing with kids one, two, maybe even three years older than him, right? Get used to it. Stop crying. Or stop playing the sport. End of story.
-signed a parent of an on age kid who played against holdbacks for years and was better for it by high school.

Any shake ups with teams? Now is the time to guest play and make it or get cut. True got a new goalie. 91 got some FCA Blue players topping the roster at 30. Imagine Crabs will be bringing in 27s soon. Where are the bottom 10 players from Crabs moving to?

Has Next Level considered trying to score in some of their games? Pretty tough when you give up an average of 3 goals and change a game and go 1-3.

They have great D group supportin by 2 very good goalies. Virtually no offensive power. Couple of decent middies, really lacking a player who can score regularly

You do realize they aren't in HS. That's like saying "you do realize that kids will be 21 at some point".

-Signed, we all know your signature about being an "on-age" parent is a lie.

Dude you cheated all the way to HS. Congratulations.

11 thousand followers on WS instagram page. Tell me again how this is just a regular tournament lol!!!

It’s a decent field, but weaker than the fields at like NAL, NLF, or Naptown. It’s missing the best teams from New England like Laxachusetts and 3D New England, has none of the top Maryland teams, is missing the best teams in the south like Team 91 GA and ATL Rhino, and the best teams in the west like Texas Nationals, WCS, and Mad Dog West.

It’s in the same status as a good LI tournament like Tristar, except Tristar had a little bit stronger field.