A lot of talent on Long Island? Completely agree! But I am fascinated by the whole club team thinking. It seems to me with more than one post about how good Long Island lacrosse is that teams like Comsewogue, Rocky Point, SWR, Smithtown, Three Villages, GC, etc would want to go the club route. Is the coaching so poor in these places that your kid needs to go to the club teams? In my experience it seems the club teams are more concerned about winning tournaments and having a large photo album on website then they are about coaching. If you are able to assemble really good kids, chances are you will do well. You could make the case that the coaching is better at the town team level as they do not have as much talent and the coach is able to find a way to be competitive and have fun with what he has. Anyway, this was the way back in the 70's, 80's (as I date myself) and this way did not hurt any recruitment of players. With technology today if your kid is good enough he will be found. The HS coach believe it or not is still the go to person when a school needs to know about a player
Unfortunately some of the towns do not have a large pool of kids to choose from to form a town travel team. The other issues are commiting to travel or the expense of traveling. I have spoken to many parents and they can not or will not travel for these reasons as well as they have other children to think about. I only have one son so I try to do everything that he wants to do as long as nothing conflicts. My son played for the 7th/8th grade town team and the JV town team that played in local summer leagues. He also played on a travel team. He is now playing in the fall league with Lax Pro. I can see the difference in his game from playing with other kids as well as from learning from different coaches.
I honestly believe that he had the most competition playing on the travel team and now Lax Pro. He also will have great memories traveling and playing with the travel team as well as creating new friendships. I guess the bottom line is you have to do what is good for your kid and what he wants to do. At this age they can make smart choices.
