BOTC - US Lacrosse Community Forum Forums PENNSYLVANIA LACROSSE PENNSYLVANIA FORUM Boys 2023

What's nonsense is Freedom has a tournament in there backyard and yet the 23's don't play. Coach has a chance to fly kids in from all over the east coast to play for Dukes and he forgets all about Freedom...

The Freedom coach only cares about Dukes National, total Dbag who thinks his kid is way better than he is. He better enjoy this now, because as he gets older he is going to get his little butt kicked.

The Dukes at NXT could be the 91 kids Dad's from a size perspective

Here come the Holdback apologists saying 91 parents should just have their kids play rec if they can't take playingbagainst older bigger kids in 3...2....1

They met in the semis. Awesome game! Both teams played incredibly well and BL won 4-3. Great parents on the sidelines and great young men on the field. All should be proud!

Dukes Nationals needs a double Holdback at attack to beat BL. I guess the Freedom daddy ball wasn't enough to secure the win. You will never beat us head up.

Pot meet kettle. Bl has enough hold backs it shouldn't matter.

Simply put BL beat 91B team by one goal, Dukes beats BL by two goals.......not one A team from Long Island attends....Philly lacrosse is a notch below.

Everyday is a different day, Crabs beat 91A at NLF by 1 goal , Hawks killed the Crabs at the Crabs tourney and BL beat Hawks at Summer exposure , so you can spin it any way you want , at the 2023 level there is no dominate team but a bunch at the top . Dukes is not even in the conversation , they are a mercenary team with kids from 7 different states with different players every time they play .

Duke's Nationals 2023 takes NXT Cup 2023 AA Championship yesterday over BL! Let's hear ALL THE EXCUSES FROM THE BL GROUP......LOL! Let it roll fellas

Excuses are explanations without good reasons. Not everyone will recognize a good reason or concede however reasonable they are, so let's do this instead. It was a great weekend of lacrosse for this BL parent and the hard working kids who played some great lacrosse. Congratulations, Dukes. By the score it appears the teams were well matched although you might disagree. Winning is by far more fun than losing, but a bad day (if you want to call it that) on the lacrosse field is so much sweeter than a good day of writing inflammatory posts on a youth lacrosse forum. So, fella, care to share which team your son plays on? Which tournaments has the team won recently? Are you a gloating Dukes parent or do you have some pent up bitterness because your sons team hasn't made it to a championship game? My, my, let the vitriol fly.

No excuses, just reasons. There are not a true team, most importantly. They need to verify ages on those kids. Holdback is one thing, but 2 of those kids were turning 14 in the next few weeks. They are playing against 11 and 12 years olds. How can they get any enjoyment out of that? What happened to pride and sportsmanship?

Agreed. Dukes will lose most of their games moving forward (which is normal for them). Just had some extra help this weekend. I would not consider them a top 10.

Ha! Ain't that the truth! The battle of the holdbacks vs the double-holdbacks. Both break the rules with extreme regularity

How did your sons team do?

Brotherly Love doesn't have a single hold back. A hold back is a kid that "repeats" a grade for academic, social, or athletic purposes. Do we have kids that have summer birthdays absolutely, who doesn't, but that is not a hold back. Before you start bad mouthing teams and claiming they are cheating might want to get your facts straight.

Well said, it's likely most of this is not from BL or Dukes. Good game BL parent from a Dukes parent. We'll see you again soon in another tough tournament, as others make excuses as to why they aren't playing.

For the record: I do not believe you are a BL parent, but the 2 boys you are referring to are both 12 and younger than no less than 9 of the players on the BL 2023, based on the ages on wsyl website.

Kids turning 13 this summer are not considered holdbacks? That's and odd view of things.

I think you're talking about the BL 2022 team fella. Good try though.

Get your facts straight! If they are Summer 04 birthdays then they are holdbacks and should be playing 2022. My son is a Summer 05 birthday and plays 2023. I could personally care less about hold backs because we play AA in MD, the holdback capital of lacrosse.
But save me the sanctimonious Summer birthday BS! You have older kids just own it

Nope 2023. You tell me which ones don't play 2023?
43, 5, 6, 12, 17, 18, 24, 4 (maybe 4 plays 2022)

A few thoughts on the issue of holdbacks. What better simulation for the real world than competing on an uneven playing field? There will always be bigger, faster, stronger, older kids on the other team. Every time a team loses at least one parent will point to the bigger and hairier kids on that team and cry foul. Human nature. More often than not those kids are on the right team. Grade based teams and those who would exploit the loopholes to assemble older teams are unavoidable. This is life and we can complain about it and make excuses or we can take a lesson from real life. There will always be adults out there with degrees from more prestigious colleges, who are better looking, stronger, wiser, more connected etc. etc. As adults, we compete with them every day on the lacrosse field of life. What do we want to teach our sons? Do we want them to run around whining "It's not fair, he's bigger than me, he's older" or do we want them to control what they can, play hard, be sportsmanlike and improve their game?

You are a Dukes Parent and you are going to gloat over beating a local club team 9-7? If you ask me you should be embarrassed. My kid played for Empire and we played you in the semis. Embarrassing, you bring kids from all over the place, flying some in and you beat Brotherly Love by 2 goals. Give me a break if you are going to be an all star team in you should have blown them out. Then on top of that the BL dad I was sitting next to told me that Brotherly Love was missing 4-5 key players due to vacations and what not. He said they were missing two poles, fogo, and attack.

Give me a break for an ALL STAR Team that was beating everyone else by 10 goals or more to beat a local team of just local kids by 2 goals...underwhelming.

BL was not missing anyone. They had a very good player last year that did not come back this year. With that being said, they are still a very high level team, possibly condidered elite level. They are strong at every position. To lose to that ridiculous Dukes team by only 2 proves how great they are.

Dukes parents should be ashamed; however, we know that they aren't because that's exactly the team they all want to be on. It's repulsive.

Whomever is looking up birthdates on WSYl website check in to an institution , get a life loser!

BL played with 3 poles , no LSM the entire game and missing one of their top faceoff kids which enabled Dukes to dominate wing play on the face offs.

#2 or #3 faceoff kid is not changing that game at all. Their pole is not missing, he doesn't play for them anymore. Big difference. They played well, no need to make excuses. They are an awesome team that played against a stacked lineup of more overage kids.

Wait till the play for a club and actually get coached up

Actual the pole still plays with BL, he played at the WSYL and then took a break. He is returning for the 2018 Season. Just setting the record straight.

Dukes South teams last summer. All teams were pulled out of the Patriot games.

As the parent of a Dukes 2023 player I would like more context to the "repulsive shame" I should be feeling as stated above. I am slightly shocked to see anyone from the Empire 2023 team make any comments. I witnessed adults verbally berate and attack a 12-year-old child from the sideline. I have played and coached for 18 plus years and have never witnessed such vile reprehensible behavior by adults directed at a child. I would suggest that maybe the Empire 23's take a hard look at the A or B level if they do not like the competition or just remain in their LI bubble. This unfortunate experience aside, I genuinely wish good luck to the Empire players, I am certain there are quality people in the organization that mean well.

The main focus should be about the ability of the players, however, it is about uneducated, misinformed adults, verbally accosting players, parents, and coaches with accusations of cheating.


BL is a tough competitor and was a local powerhouse. Dukes NATIONALS is an age-appropriate team of kids from various states that sought out a more competitive club experience.

You would be amazed how many parents complain yet inquire about participation in the Duke's Nationals program. If you feel your son has the skill level, feel feee to attend an open tryout.

The ability to post anonymously on this forum is the only reason it still exists and thrives. I will be happy to own my post.

JF
Dukes 2023 Parent
(Man child's father)

As the parent of a Dukes 2023 player I would like more context to the "repulsive shame" I should be feeling as stated above. I am slightly shocked to see anyone from the Empire 2023 team make any comments. I witnessed adults verbally berate and attack a 12-year-old child from the sideline. I have played and coached for 18 plus years and have never witnessed such vile reprehensible behavior by adults directed at a child. I would suggest that maybe the Empire 23's take a hard look at the A or B level if they do not like the competition or just remain in their LI bubble. This unfortunate experience aside, I genuinely wish good luck to the Empire players, I am certain there are quality people in the organization that mean well.

The main focus should be about the ability of the players, however, it is about uneducated, misinformed adults, verbally accosting players, parents, and coaches with accusations of cheating.


BL is a tough competitor and was a local powerhouse. Dukes NATIONALS is an age-appropriate team of kids from various states that sought out a more competitive club experience.

You would be amazed how many parents complain yet inquire about participation in the Duke's Nationals program. If you feel your son has the skill level, feel feee to attend an open tryout.

The ability to post anonymously on this forum is the only reason it still exists and thrives. I will be happy to own my post.

JF
Dukes 2023 Parent
(Man child's father)

Give me a break for an ALL STAR Team that was beating everyone else by 10 goals or more to beat a local team of just local kids by 2 goals...underwhelming.[/quote]
100% agree with this, if you are a "National" team, you Dane well should be blowing out local yokal teams by way more than 2. And, BL is a decent team, but their lacrosse IQ is very low, too bad they don't have good coaching because they would be way better too!

Dukes team was an all star team with kids from 7 states as you say, somehow they should have won by 6 or 7 goals and not squeak through. Agreed, must have been bad coaching or low lacrosse IQ.

100% agree with this, if you are a "National" team, you Dane well should be blowing out local yokal teams by way more than 2. And, BL is a decent team, but their lacrosse IQ is very low, too bad they don't have good coaching because they would be way better too![/quote]

You sir are a moron, the team hardly practices due to CCLA schedule, but Kivlein is as good a coach as anyone out there.

You sir are a moron, the team hardly practices due to CCLA schedule, but Kivlein is as good a coach as anyone out there. [/quote]

It's true, the comments about coaching and IQ aren't fair. They sure can stir up a heated discussion and debate though. I know the organization has a goal in the upcoming year to do a better job working around league schedules, etc., so it will be fun to see what will happen when the kids do get the practice that has been lacking. I will acknowledge, though, that I can't imagine the Dukes National team gets much practice either given how spread out they are. I do like the "local yokal" tag. It says a lot about this group of boys, most living within 10 miles of one another (much different than 10 miles on LI!) that they can compete at the level they do. I like the fact that they make it into discussions like this. Shows they are on the radar. They don't have a big budget, don't travel much and let the competition come to them from all over the country. And, more often than not they beat those teams. So, claims of bad coaching and low lacrosse IQ, etc., is nothing more than envy masked in a false narrative. So much frustration and for what purpose? I rarely if ever read a post from a BL parent gloating and claiming their team is better than everyone else. I get that it can be fun to stir the hornets nest, but some of the comments on here say more about the IQ of the poster than a 2 point loss says about a teams IQ.

Maybe Duke's National should be at Naptown to play True National and let the Freedom team play against the local PA teams in a local tournament.

I

It's true, the comments about coaching and IQ aren't fair. They sure can stir up a heated discussion and debate though. I know the organization has a goal in the upcoming year to do a better job working around league schedules, etc., so it will be fun to see what will happen when the kids do get the practice that has been lacking. I will acknowledge, though, that I can't imagine the Dukes National team gets much practice either given how spread out they are. I do like the "local yokal" tag. It says a lot about this group of boys, most living within 10 miles of one another (much different than 10 miles on LI!) that they can compete at the level they do. I like the fact that they make it into discussions like this. Shows they are on the radar. They don't have a big budget, don't travel much and let the competition come to them from all over the country. And, more often than not they beat those teams. So, claims of bad coaching and low lacrosse IQ, etc., is nothing more than envy masked in a false narrative. So much frustration and for what purpose? I rarely if ever read a post from a BL parent gloating and claiming their team is better than everyone else. I get that it can be fun to stir the hornets nest, but some of the comments on here say more about the IQ of the poster than a 2 point loss says about a teams IQ. [/quote]

The people posting about this are not involved with either organization. Both teams have bright futures, continue your hard work and ignore the envy.

So True Nationals has defeated Team 91 Bandits for the championship in the Naptown National Challenge, congratulations!!!!. Am I understanding correctly (based on their website) that True Nationals is comprised of players from various states? Does anyone want to bash True Nationals for having kids from numerous states like they have Dukes Nationals? Just food for thought!