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

This is a great question. The only reason Madlax has been able to field a team this fall— and this is FACT— is because True Chesapeake and VLC imploded, basically don’t exist as they did at the end of summer. Other than 5-6 legacy Madlax kids, they’re all bolt ons from these clubs and 4-6 flyins.

Not sure where they’ll go. Not many options.

My son is new to the team. They are a solid group of athletes. Weak at attack and f/o but D is stacked and goalie was unstoppable this past weekend. Zero f/o wins, few shots on Hawks goalie. ML goalie showed he will keep them in the game. No one is going anywhere. Sorry you still aren’t happy at DCE.

For private school more yes. There are athletic scholarships for lax. If you are interested in a school go to their events, talk to the coach.

Yes it happens. But since most of the application processes have begun for 9th grade, any high school coach at fall tournaments are still trying to sway the kids that they have already been talking to. I would think any player that they are trying to recruit has already been communicated with several times. There may be a few kids that were not on the radar that they see and make a pitch to try and get.

This seems like a great opportunity for VLC to try to start reaching out to kids that tried out the past couple seasons. I mean they did bring back their 2027 team.

- People are not happy with ML ownership.
- DCE and NL have almost 30 kids on BOTH of their teams.
- True VA does not have a strong High School history in the area.

Then list goes on....

Bethesda, McClean and surrounding areas are only about 30-40 minutes away from a team like Team MD who is a strong AAA team. I'm sure a short trip up 270 (addition of 5-6 kids) and you would have a great team. All the other Elite teams minus 91 seem pretty set.

It’s Goalie Dad again, he’s back with his Tourette’s

I think Team Maryland lost their best player to DC Express, but I could be mistaken. Attackman.

They have athletic scholarships for LAX? "The More You Know"

Merit = secret athletic scholarships.....

ML goalie dad, whose kid didn't even start before the old ML goalie left for DCE, really has a lot to say. Unfortunate he's such a lunatic because his son is a nice kid. Anyway, regarding more ML players leaving -- it's a fact. Minimum 2 more legacy MLers leave post-fall. It's pretty well known who they are amongst the boys. My prediction of the two....one to NL and one more to DCE.

What schools were there?

ML's unstoppable goalie gave up only one fewer goal to Hawks than the DCE B team goalie, despite ML stacked D.

How many VLC kids went over? We already know how many True Chesapeake went over from Goalie Dad...

True shows that eventually the market who knows lax will push back on grifting. Hogan, CM, .... detest em, love em. These are names in the lax world and they've delivered often. True has never shown a "true" leader as a coach, more running from programs people disliked to promises of better was their bread and butter. I don't think you have to have a name. Like Fyre festival simply listing a product and price is not delivering. Deliver good lax for our boys. That's all. 3k, 5k, 10k. Sure with results.

I could see that DCE B goalie getting moved up.

There are a bunch of kids on DCE’s team that are better than the kids on their A team. I assume they’ll shuffle after spring.

In certain positions or across the board?

If your kid is on ProStart the SMA guys already know who he is. In general I would suggest reaching out to the coaches of the schools he's interested in. They will go to your games. My son is fortunate enough to be on a team where coaches are at a bunch of games. I know some of the kids on our team have received some money (all talk) but it's the kids that are game changers, like kids who will play as freshman in MIAA-A type players. Others just get recruited but will pay their own way.

You should also remember that some of the schools can't contact you unless you get on their admissions list. Others will reach out through mutual acquantences to get you to touch base with admissions then will reach out full force. All of the coaches we've spoken to have been really easy to deal with and frank.

Hope this helps.

For a team with two fall wins, DCE sure gets a lot of talk on this board.

Going to be a long winter.

They do? I don’t get the impression they’ve been pounding their chests at all, and we played them. They have talent, they’re just figuring it out with 25+ kids. They’ve been a team for 2 months, I’d expect them to come out if the winter a much better team than in October.
The best team I’ve seen is Crabs. Vastly improved. Not at the Hawks level, but they’ll compete. Not surprising I suppose, from what I’ve hearts as it relates to the program’s reclass methods.

Solid advice. To add: I know that your son (yes you) is very talented and definitely going upper D1. But these schools can be picky all day, every day and by 8th grade, the typical (competitive) lax kid is about 5'5", 125lb and has a 65-70mph shot if he plays offense. The 8th grader who "gets money" is more likely 6'1", 170lb, with an 80mph shot and also has good grades and a good student conduct record.

At the most holistic level, the sports coaches are only given X amount of "pure passes" in terms of admissions and financial aid. Many of the 9th grade lax kids are coming from private K-8 schools with 3.9+ GPAs and a decent lax resume', and typically a solid second or third sport too. Those kids will get offered $0 in aid. There's a reason these BOTC boards get 70% less active once the posters' sons hit 9th grade. Cause #1 - "Oh my kid's actually NOT gonna play varsity in 9th...and probably not 10th, and is getting $0.00 in financial aid after all. Embarrassing (really, it's not)." Cause #2 - "My kid didn't get into an MIAA or IAC school that we were willing to pay for....the closest MIAA-C school is not even as good as our public school. Humiliating! (really, it's not)."

A few important data points:
Acceptance rates at the "top 50% in lax" private schools: 6th grade (40-50%), 7th grade (0-10%), 8th grade (0-10%), 9th grade (10-30%)
Athletic Aid given to 9th graders who aren't "virtually guaranteed" to make Varsity in 9th: Typically $0
Academic Aid given to 9th graders who have less than a 3.5 in private school or 3.75 in public school: Typically $0
9th graders who make Varsity at "good lax schools": 0 to 5 per school, per year.
# of kids who will try out for lax every spring at the "major lax schools:" 125 to 175 (there were 80+ 2028s at Loyola's prospect night this week).

Team is definitely looking for chemistry. Just started practicing together 2 months ago, yet they’ve had the lead late in all 4 losses against decent/solid teams (Next Level, Crabs, PrimeTime), all of which were 1 or 2 goal losses. Could very easily be 6-0. I suspect their coach will figure it out, has knows more about the game than ML and NL coaches combined.

Who is the coach and what are the objective reasons why you say he’s substantiated more knowledgeable than the NL and ML coaches? I know that the ML coach has personality issues, but I thought that both the ML and NL coaches have been around the game their whole lives and know the game as well or better than anyone. I’m not looking to start an argument or to hear ad hominem attacks on anyone, but what makes the DCE coach more knowledgeable.

Is it Ray Megill? If so, the previous poster is correct. Knows more than those two guys combined. And it’s really not close.

Hardly a secret and as other posters said, pretty easy to defend merit aid if the kid is running a 4.9sec 40 and also holds a 3.8 from a feeder private school, and, say, also plays football. But for most student athletes this is not a real thing at least for 9th grade. Why would they fund a student who might not play varsity for 2 years?

Last poster was also correct in noting that any HS coaches out there were to watch the same 3-4 players for Hawks. Not "watch the Hawks," not "watching 8th grade players." Why is only 3-4 players? Because they already know who's available, including who has a 2.2 GPA at a Calvert County public school, and likely would struggle with academics in a McDonogh, St. Pauls, Gilman environment.

The last testing dates for the Catholic HSPT are in 4 weeks. If you're waiting for a coach from STM, Spalding, MSJ, Loyola, Curley, CHC, John Carroll to show up on your doorstep and they haven't, the countdown is on.

Or talk to your son's team's coach. Most of the coaches of 8th grade teams should be relatively tied into the local HS scene, so if you want an intro your coach should be able to help.

Or just email the HS coach directly, no need to make it complicated. They will be very happy to hear from any 8th grader who's playing higher level club lacrosse that has any interest in their school.

One more week of fall tournaments, then things turn to “which school is getting the best 2028 class” for the next three months.

Grades > than playing ability. Coaches will take a kid with a high GPA over an elite, but dense athlete 10 out of 10 times. Period. I have 4 kids who all play the sport. It's only gotten more pronounced the past 4 or 5 yrs. Fwiw

If your kid is a good player on a top team, has good grades, and the parents don’t make a lot of money, you’d be surprised at how affordable some of these schools become. Especially, for the Baltimore schools that charge over $30k for typical students. The other issue is boosters, outside the school, who cut tuition checks. Not sure how widespread this is currently, but there definitely used to be a couple high net worth guys who propped up a certain program that has become very good in the past 3-4 years.

So all this time he should've been hitting the books instead of the wall?

100%.

If you hear from a coach, that's a good sign too.

100%. Have your son email the coach. If you have a short video, send it along.

Lots of HS coaches attend these fall tournaments. Keep an eye out. Introduce yourself.

I have been through this process twice now. I detest to break it to you, but the reality is out of this entire class, MIAA coaches are essentially fighting over 10-15 kids in total. They will happily take anyone who applies, but the process is more like college these days the top 10 kids get all the serious attention.

Saturday 2028 NAL field is really strong. I think all 8 teams are top 20, 4-5 of them top 10. Significant drop off to Sunday for some reason. Thought Sunday was “the day” for this event

If by 10-15 kids at each school sure.

Way more than 10-15 kids in the class are being wooed by coaches.

That said, Coaches probably have 5-8 kids they really want, 10 they’d be happy to have and everyone else at near full pay is happy to show up.

Ton of great matchups at NAL today. 3d NE managed to come out on top. 91 Venom had a great run too. Even consolation games were elite

Over in MD, 2Way stomped everyone. Beat NL 11-3. Closest game came from 3d GA, 10-6.

Did the Madlax fly-ins miss their flights? They got embarrassed at their own event. Good riddance. Maybe CM will retire