Lax is my favorite sport and my sons. They also play travel football and hockey (dropped soccer years ago). All the sports they play at a very high level are based on on birth year, period-with the exception of lacrosse. One of my kids is January bday and one is Dec. Advantage for one, disadvantage for the other but they still made all their respective travel A teams and compete. There is no logical argument for any kids playing YOUTH sports not to be strictly aged based. Once kids get into High school years I have no problem with rules going grade based. My Dec son had to play soccer a year up and hockey and football continually, but it is fair and creates a level playing field. I'm no snowflake. This is just simple, reasonable stuff. Lacrosse rules, or lack there of are a joke.
Everyone knows it is the right thing to do, Unfortunately many lacrosse coaches sons in the top clubs are holdbacks and will be for years to come as many do prefirst or heldback from starting school.
In Youth lax, Hold backs should compete on age like everyone else. If the graduation year grouping is due to recruiters, then keep at HS. Recruiters aren’t looking at elementary or middle school kids.
Yes, all of this! Young kids playing sports are not focused on playing in college and most will not go on to do so. Their parents shouldn't be worried about "D1 prospects" when they are 8 or 10 or even 12. Yes, the elite players can manage playing up or being competitive against a team of "holdbacks" but for the rest it contributes to making youth sports less enjoyable and beneficial. Let them play on age based teams until high school. Transparency about ages in recruiting would also help. Remember when Under Armour Lax used to list player birth dates but then they stopped because it was getting embarrassing for certain players and regions? Why not include birth month and year with high school recruiting rankings and write ups at least during freshman and sophomore year of high school?
The school cutoff date is 9/1 in my community. Nowadays almost every boy and girl with a July or August birthday waits a year to begin Kindergarten. No one wants their kid to be at a disadvantage in any way because they are the youngest. With the boys it's very common practice with June and May birthdays and sometimes even February, March and April. I have a son who is young for his grade but was not held back. Years ago had a couple kids on his middle school club team who were almost exact same age but a grade behind in private school. Back then the club enforced age cutoffs so the hold backs had to play with the grade they should be in. Those kids committed to play D1 lax at a lower level program but then reclassed AGAIN and traded up to better D1 lax programs. My son is beginning his 3rd year of college and they are the same age but will be freshman in college this fall. Good for them I guess but I wonder how it feels knowing they had to compete against kids 2+ years younger for their achievements.
