BOTC - US Lacrosse Community Forum Forums PENNSYLVANIA LACROSSE PENNSYLVANIA FORUM Boys 2022

Yes, a lot of positives from yesterday. Teams where looking good for first outing of the fall.

Two major tournaments last year WSYL and 2022 National Championships - neither won by Hawks.

WysL was a joke. #18-6

Hawks did win 3 out of the Top 6 Major Tournaments last year.Aslo didn't lose a game in best league around. Probably impossible to run the table for any team. Too many very good teams. It pretty clear who had the best team last year if you know anything about lacrosse.

None of those tourneys had the notoriety of wsyl and natl championship. Good wins but not ones that people would notice.

Not ones people would notice? Now that’s comical. Every coach and team noticed. NLF and Big H are NY and PA biggest events . Young Guns was also stacked and is always a Top Tourney. Getting beat by an All Star stacked team in Naptown and lost to a very good MM team in which MM actually cried. Please do not act like WSYL had any credibility when they changed the cut off date mid stream and left dozens of the best teams out . All teams that were at the Big H
Naptown and Young Guns. Final 4 teams at WSYL were all beaten at NLF by Hawks- - which no one noticed!

That Dukes National team had multiple 21's on it - not even hold backs and is an all start team. Every kid on that team has a primary team not named Dukes. Doesn't count IMO.

91 MD did beat them at 22 Nationals - but I believe they played other times all won by Hawks - though could be wrong here.

As for WSYL no way it is as good as Naptown, 22 Nationals, etc. Igloo, Primetime, LI and a bunch of average teams.

So all in all let me change my statement to "One of the best 2022 teams in the country". Others include LI, Igloo, T91MD, etc. Another two that won some decent games were Bucktown and Richmond Greyhounds.

Was McFarland I saw the announcement and he is now on staff at Fusion full time. Another big coaching pick up over at Fusion. They are lacking the horses to play high end A or AA but they have damn good coaches for developing kids.

Bucktown really?

It's a shame they don't have more horsepower on the team. The staff is one of the best around.
The coaching at Fusion and NXT is the best around. I don't think anyone would argue that.
Why don't they pull in the talent?

only have full open tryouts at certain grade years. When you let everyone know only a 4-5 spots are available each year no one wants to waste their time. This is where being too honest hurts them, as all other teams say open tryouts when truly there are only a few spots probably available. 9th grade year is full open tryout. As they have shown with past teams during full open tryouts, they will turn the roster. They should do it every year as I am sure more people would come due to the coaching staff.

I know the NXT program well and every year is an open tryout. They just don't get the caliber player that the others attract (Freedom, HHH, Mesa).
My understanding is that fusion does ask for a two year commitment from your kid and, in turn, he has a spot for those two years.
NXT High School has a great program that will attract many from other programs. With the recruiting rules changing, this may hurt them a little.

Honestly don't get it either. Great coaches with some top end players but last spring Fusion was pasted in the Mid Atlantic league. Saw one game against Blackstorm and another against Freedom and it was UGLY.

Maybe Fusio just came late to the party and the best 2021, 2022, 2023, etc were already on teams?

Great box program though.

They beat Freedom last summer didn't they?

Inside Lacrosse and other major outlets covered WSYL and 2022 National Championships. The only people that knew what was going on at the other events were the people who attended.

Major outlets? Haha.. your too much, we get it you hate the Hawks. I guess your team wasn't at any of the other events ?Which one did they win? Tournaments that every single top flight team at this age group was at. Except the ones not invited. You do also know that almost every major club is a member of all or at minimum one of those tournaments. All that were covered by Major (twitter) Outlets including Inside lacrosse. Keep on hating its comical.

Better luck this year.

And there you have it..Another lame remark by a sore loser. Luck has nothing to do with it. Winning every single game has nothing to do with it. Which all explains your remarks and post. Sounds like you need the luck!

How are the two NXT teams looking

I heard Black is pretty good. Better then they were last year added some talent, the big D pole from Team 11 and one of the two good D poles that were on Fusion. Also some real fast kid at middie.

I am sure they still have the real good fogo and giant d pole they already had on D.

End of the day though they needed a roster rebuild. I saw them last year year get smacked by Young Guns, South Shore and Predators. And they had a rough Spring in the Mod Atlantic.

One day at a time...

Lost a few and added a few.
The net/net (Black A Team): D is below average, added 2-3 real middie talents, FOGO is very solid, attack is average, goalies are pretty OK.
Seem to be unselfish, team oriented kids but that's from watching 5 practices. Game time will tell the tale.
Compared to last year? Upgraded squad. Still a few players away from being close to the upper tier but the coaching is fantastic and hopefully they can develop these boys.

Heard of the D hurt his ankle pretty good so will miss the tournaments in the Fall. Damn shame hate to see kids get banged up.

Some good teams at the West Chester Invitational. Freedom should win.

What about Bortherly Love? Do they have an A & B at the 2002 level or is it only one 2022 team? If so think they could win.

The rest including Fusion and Team 11 not in the same class as those other two.

Anybody know anything about Gaffer Elite? NY right?

The Bucktown team from NC that beat Freedom is stacked with all the best players from the Triangle. All headed to Father Gibbons to play lax. And keep in mind, there aren’t many programs, so the talent is concentrated.

Yeah the Bucktown team and Richmond Greyhounds are good teams - both beat Freedom last year.

Freedom 2022 still sets the bar in Philly IMO but they are not as dominant as they used to be. Teams catching up to them, 91, etc. it happens when kids get older and the advantage of starting younger gets less and less.

Winning every game except for the ones you have a great excuse for isn't really winning every game.

BL wins it all convincingly

What I figured would happen. BL is a pretty good team. Do they do any box?

So let's review why NXT runs the best tourneys around...
Freedom payday this weekend: Teams playing at 8, 10, 4? Some 8, 12, 4 or 5?
I've been to so many NXT tourneys over the years and they run everything so much better. Usually play, hour break, play, hour break, play, go home. You usually get 3 games in 5 hours.
This Freedom thing is a joke. Come on guys. Spending your Sunday at the fields may be fun for you but this is poorly run and doesn't reflect well on your org skills.
A 3 game tourney should not take all day. 8-6 for some teams. That's 10 hours of a Sunday to play 3 games. Lame.
Get your $hit together daddies!!!
And Sons will play FCA in finals where FCA will win.

Plus it's going to rain all day

Fantastic!!!
What ever happened to real playdays?
Originally 4 teams would get together and play one another. No champ game. No trophies. Just some fall LAX to gauge what needs worked on.
All you needed was two fields and some referees. Cost was split between the 4 clubs.
If you ran it with one other age group it became play, off a game, play, off a game, play, go home.
So much easier to find 3 other like-talented teams and go this route, no?
Instead I'm going to be hungover watching LAX in the rain ALL DAMN DAY!!!

Yea, too much of the trophy hand-outs, we need the old school play for pride back.

Was at the Freedom Play Day.

First kudos to Freedom for getting more fields and going while most tournaments were cancelled - with Fall sports and other events rescheduling never works and while it sucked playing and watching in the rain it worked out and was the right thing to do. Though obviously offense was harder to come bye - my son said he couldn't see a damn thing the first game and said the 3rd was even harder.

My thoughts:

Freedom & FCA looked good splitting a set of games. Not sure what happened in the championship as FCA won 4-3 because I watched the first game and thought Freedom was clearly better winning I think 7-3 or 7-2.

NXT Black was hammered by everyone. NXT just didn't have the horses - good coaching and well run organization but if they play the Black team in top events they will lose a ton.

Sons and South Shore look like decent A level teams - Sons are overrated as usual, only realy good Sons team is the 20's IMO. South Shore goalie is a beast, only a matter of time before the big dogs try to take him.

Patriot real solid team as usual. Good Jersey team, plays physical like all Jersey teams and have a good offense.

Real surprise was Dukes Young Guns - didn't expect much but beat NXT pretty good and lost in the championship bracket to FCA 3-2 in a great game. Overall better then I expected when I saw them in the field.

Overall good event with good teams. Was fun but wet.

NXT was not great at all.
Little disappointed as I am considering moving there for HS program.
As long as coaching is good I guess that's what counts.
It is only a fall payday but they did look bad. Couldn't win a FO and clears were atrocious...They have a few middies that can play but one kid I saw try and take it himself no less than 4x. Thru 4 people. This isn't rec LAX and the kid did not have the skill to be attempting to put the team on his back.
Coaches benched him after the 4th attempt tho. Thats encouraging.
NXT 23s looked good tho.

we must have been watching different games. NXT 22 has one of the best FO guys in the area and he was absolutely in the + column for faceoff wins.

Sons FOGO was the only dominant FOGO there. He's legit but has minimal supporting cast. Watched some of their games. Are they coaching that big kid to try and bull dodge? It's almost comical. Seriously. Who's coaching them again, Tad?

I was surprised that the NXT FOGO was losing as much as he did. Usually a damn good FOGO but the FCA kid and Dukes kid roughed him up a bit and won more then half.

The Sons FOGO is damn good would like to see how he does against Tristate Black, LI Express and BBL Elite FOGO's they are the three best I have seen @ 2022.

LeadingEdge has the best 2022 FOGO