It depends what you want out of it but for me a top 20 program is a combination of both good academics + good lax but that’s not everyone’s priority. Mind you that any kid who goes to any school and gets and education is good in my book. But my (just an opinion) top 20 dual threat academics + lax (with academics > lax in terms of weight)
1) Duke 2) yale 3) notre dame 4) hopkins 5) penn 6) cornell 7) virginia 8) Princeton 9) Michigan 10) gtown 11) UNC 12) Maryland 13) Harvard 14) Brown 15) Army 16) Navy 17) Rutgers 18) BU 19) Penn state 20 Syracuse
Honorable mention academic mention to Dartmouth and Colgate - terrible lax
Honorable lax mention to Denver
Just Outside the top 20: Richmond, lehigh, Ohio state, nova, Air Force
Lax is just one of those sports where the best lax schools are also the best academic schools. Not really the case in college football, basketball, hockey or baseball.
Leave the rankings to the pros. #3 on the bogus list above got spanked yesterday at Gtown Prep. ND might have lost to GP is there was a game 2.