BOTC - US Lacrosse Community Forum Forums MID-ATLANTIC LACROSSE MARYLAND FORUM MD Girls 2028

No one is questioning their win/s and what they have done, they are a championship team. However, if you watched the Finals game, you would have noticed that Coppermine just ran out of time. The M&D middies were gassed and they were just holding the ball as best they could while Coppermine's speed took over. If you were to compare both great teams, M&D lacks some of the speed Coppermine has and Coppermine lacks some size M&D has etc. Both teams can get some quality additions to make both better this summer.

They’ll be looking for speed with good skill level (who isn’t?). Also guessing good defenders could find a home with them.

Good luck to all the teams participating in Lax for the Cure. Hope your girls play hard, have fun, and respect the game!

And who isn't looking for good defenders? Same logic applies. Every team out there has maybe 1-2 at best good defenders and can always improve in that area.

The girls are still young and have much to learn and develop, no position should be off the table. Take the best athletes with the best stick skills and teach them to play where your team needs them. Athletecism and stick skills > position specific knowledge at this stage of the game.

I agree with this 100-%. Find athletes with size. The best teams improve every offseason.

Need more of this positive vibe!

Pretty surprising to see Hero's beat M&D by 4 goals. Maybe M&D was without some players?

Pretty hard to win when you control 2 draws all day. Both teams are solid and m and d will beat hero’s again

Not sure what this person is talking about. M&D lost because they were probably like 2/12 on shots. Hero’s goalie had a great game and deserves a lot of credit for that win.

Congratulations to MD United for taking home the tourney championship! What a great weekend of lacrosse for a great cause. The highlight of the weekend was seeing the long line of girls waiting to meet Ally Mastroianni. Also, it was great to see Emma Ward on the sidelines coaching her former Club’s 28 team and then taking time to sign balls and take pictures with the girls.

This.

Specialization in any position besides goalie and draw specialist before high school is ridiculous and inhibiting many girls development.

I ran into a friend at lax for the cure who had a 2030!daughter playing. She informed me that she was low attacker. Are you kidding me?

This is everything wrong with girls lacrosse.

Yes, congratulations to MDU. They won in a nail-biting 3v3 Braveheart vs M&D. Good work to M&D for making it to the championship. Was also great to see Skywalkers beat an undefeated Monsters to make it to the last semi-final. There are a lot of really talented players and teams at the 2028 year. And now that they are a bit older and there's more parity at the top level, the games are so much more fun to watch because anyone can win. Should make for an exciting upcoming weekend in Hershey.

Wow - impressive by MDU, M&D, and Skywalkers in finals! Go Maryland!

Monster had the easiest schedule by far avoiding all the MD teams in the top bracket aside from MDU (who beat them 10-5), so snuck into the bracket with a 3-1 record. I am most intrigued by the Steps White team (who obviously should not have been in the 4th bracket) beating Heros and losing to M&D in the semifinals 2-1. Any info on this team which I think is supposed the the Steps B team but seems pretty legit?

Interestingly, yesterday in real time they had it as Monsters beating MDU, putting Monsters in the top seed. This was definitely the case because people were scratching their heads over the result. Wonder if that impacted the playoff brackets - guess it probably wouldn't have changed the result too much. The Steps team was good. Apparently STEPS makes the brackets and always positions their teams in brackets where they will have an easy path to the playoffs.

You sound like a parent of a team that couldn’t even participate- maybe next year

Skywalkers has gotten a little better but not in same level as crush, mdu, Coppermine, m&d or hero’s

Skywalkers are better because they have borrowed players for the summer tournaments only. This means their regular players, who pays the yearly fee, gets less playing time. Starters are suddenly not starters.

Where are they "borrowing" from? Skywalkers is known to have out of state players on their teams. Why do you think they are "borrowing"?

Where are the borrowed players from? Curious to hear/see how many current Skywalkers/Crush players attend the Tucker tune up in prep to tryout for Coppermine soon.

Skywalkers is better because it has better players. No team "owns" a player. The girls that play are the team and everyone on the team is a team member. Stop looking for excuses to explain a team's success or other teams' failures.

LOL this is about the 6th time you’ve mentioned the “tucker tune up” in the last week.

Props to MDU and Hero's for bringing the Lax for Cure championships to MD 2028-2030.

I've always said MD is the center of lax, despite the talent in upstate NY and LI.

Fake news. Everyone who played is on SW's roster, which is public.

But where were they during the NGLL season?

Any predictions for Hershey this weekend?

Just because they didn't play in the Spring, does not mean they are not on the team. Again, Skywalkers is known to have girls from out of state on almost every team. Why is this such an issue for you?

Not the above poster, but I think what people were saying was the SW team that is playing this summer is better and people were wondering why. No one is saying they cheated or anything, but there are girls now playing that were not on the NGLL team (that was not very successful), so expect SW to be tougher in the summer. I don't think any of the top 5 MD teams added anyone after NGLL.

SW has one out of state player and she lives in southern PA.

Sounds like you just made it a 7th time! Who cares, wish other clubs did this.

I think many people are happy to see SW succeed. The more good teams, the better. Seems like some team/clubs would like to see SW's younger teams fail so that they can inherit the good players/not loose the good players who historically would have gone to Skywalkers towards the end of middle school due to their good reputation for recruiting.

I guarantee you more Coppermine and Crush players go to SW than the other way around.

Yes, the players that don't get playing time should and will leave and look for a better fit. Some have already reached out.

It has nothing to do with not wanting a team succeed. The more competitive teams the better. It helps everyone by upping the level of play. The questioning of out if state players comes from a place of curiosity, not spite. It just seems like an odd formula for success for a middle school team. The girls still play uear round together at this age (unlike HS when they only really have summer and falll tournaments) and this seems counter productive to team chemistry. Also not a huge selling point to attract new local talent

SW is always adding players particularly on their high school teams. And, they historically have players from out of town who play only on their summer teams because of school obligations. SW's goal is to get their players recruited not win tournaments in middle school.

Probably right on Crush players but i'll take that bet on Coppermine. Why would they leave? They will only keep getting better.

Because for some of them it will eventually become more about getting connected with college programs than winning t-shirts. Maybe not this young, but eventually.

I think you are incorrect on that. If they stay the top team in the country, they will be in the top tournaments and be seen by the top coaches. No need to ruin a top team to take a chance on a lesser team somewhere else. Things change, new clubs can enter the scene.

I think more kids will leave after 7th grade than after 6th and many will go to M&D and Heros rather than SW.

But at some point, recruiting reputation, connections to big showcases and getting into top tourneys will make a difference.

The problem Coppermine has is that their 24 and 25 teams are average at best and won't have good recruiting results. This will make it hard to keep their top players.