BOTC - US Lacrosse Community Forum Forums MID-ATLANTIC LACROSSE MARYLAND FORUM Boys 2028 Grads - Mid Atlantic Region

NL dad here. Our boys lost to this BBL team in Sunday's Millon championship. Should be a great game tomorrow with the Hawks. BBL features some very athletic, physically dominating middies who can shoot accurately on the run. One guy (#54?) was bigger, faster, stronger than any other middie we faced in HoCo or have seen on the tournament circuit this summer. Just a beast. Their two goalies were both solid. If Hawks can make a few timely saves and get their transition going, and score a couple of unsettled, they can take BBL. But playing 6v6, especially with BBL's offensive middies and their big defenders on the other side, will be a difficult task. Rooting for Hawks.

Watched the BBL-ML game. Madlax dominated the game for the first 35 minutes, up 4-1 with about 8 min to play. Completely fell apart with penalties, poor coaching, and unforced turnovers. Threw the ball away several times in final minutes of regulation up 2 goals… they’re good, they just can’t get out of their own way.
-Hawks Dad

Looked like some awesome games and parity at Naptown, minus 1 team from Michigan. True National, the Denver teams, ADVNC and Team 18 all competed with the big boys from MD, NY, NJ and Texas. Pretty impressive the Hawks are all local MD kids. Looking forward to seeing these teams get better in future tourneys.

Hawks draw from a huge geographical area, including DE and VA.

Nice to see #4 Madlax avenge loss to #46 NXT. Too bad Texas Nationals kids weren't available to win t shirts for Madlax kids at Naptown. But at least this week's losses won't count against Madlax's #4 ranking, right?

In the naptown tournament is the true national black team the same team that was on long island this past weekend in the blatant national summer showdown?

You never really know with True National but I think they last played and won the Adrenaline Cup in Delaware the same weekend as NAL. True Illinois is a strong team that travels and a few of this kids end up on National along with True Annapolis and the 40 other true clubs they can pull kids from for the bigger tournaments.

The big D isn’t as big of a factor as most think. There isn’t enough talent on ML, Hawks, Venom, Texas combined to overcome the awful coaching of ML head coach literally play by play directing his kids. Tells them to do foolish things, they do it and then he blames them for the mistake. Heard and saw it happen. Why do parents let their kids play for that guy??

The big D isn’t as big of a factor as most think. There isn’t enough talent on ML, Hawks, Venom, Texas combined to overcome the horrendous coaching of ML head coach literally play by play directing his kids. Tells them to do notIntelligent things, they do it and then he blames them for the mistake. Heard and saw it happen first time

Maybe Madlax needs to bring down a half dozen or so holdbacks from the 27s like Hawks.

BBL looked great over the past three days and could be consistently in the mix if the team is the same at future tournaments. Kudos to Hawks for pulling out the win in a crowded and talented field. Would love to get Bored MD dad to come out of retirement since Texas Nationals, True National Black and now BBL have joined Venom Madlax and Hawks who seem to be able to win any given tournament.

The War is over, The holdbacks won. Time to join the winning team.

Spot on. Screams at Y to “throw it to xxxxx,” and when X drops the pass, he screams “Y GET OFF THE FIELD.” I mean, my kid would tolerate that for about 5 minutes. Maybe because they’re still young, they take it. Once they get older, this team will truly disintegrate.

That would help. Madlax is small. If they do have holdbacks, they’re runts.

Yeah the BBL team was solid. Best middies in the tournament. But I do think they had players from their other BBL teams, maybe BBL Shore? That was not the regular BBL team, definitely some guests

Given the fact that nearly every impact player on hawks is a 2027 aged kid, it just makes 91 venoms competing with them that much more impressive.

91 will dominate this age come high school once puberty is all done.

And yes, watching Madlax’s coach run that team is truly bizzare. I have no idea how those kids actually enjoy playing for him.

In the absence of Bored MD Dad, I'll take a stab . . .

GROUP 1 - would be clear favorites against teams outside of group 1
Hawks
Madlax
Venom

GROUP 2 - could beat group 1 teams on a given day, but need to do it consistently to move to group 1
BBL
Texas Nationals
True National Black
Express North


GROUP 3 - could compete with any teams above them, but would likely be underdogs
3D NE
Next Level
2Way
Crabs
LI Express Chucks
Mad Dog West
Laxachusetts
Colorado Kings

Others: NXT, FCA, Legacy, Freedom, West Coast Starz

Considerations:
- Recency bias acknowledged - summer performance valued over spring, which is valued over fall
- Teams within each group are interchangeable and fairly even
- This is a snapshot in time - things could change dramatically based on the results of PrimeTime in 1.5 weeks

Crabs have never beaten next level, FCA or Madlax.

They should bot be in this discussion.

This looks solid except that Texas Nationals should replace Madlax in Group 1. What has Madlax won recently? They're Group 2 at best. Plus, Texas Nationals beat Venom twice in NY to win NLF earlier this summer. Anyone who was watching the last Texas Nationals v. Hawks game at Naptown is still wondering why Texas Nationals pulled their goalie after the first half! Kid completely shut the Hawks out in the first half with about 10 saves. How the coach pulls a hot hand like that in an elimination game is beyond me!

Also, Next Level deserves to be Group 2 with the hoco win. Otherwise, this looks right to me.

Making fun of kids sizes....classy.

If MadLax 2028 wants to re-load with 2027's, they had better move fast. Dad coach drove away half the team in order to get the starting attack to his liking, and they are no longer competitive with NextLevel and the Hawks. They played a Long Island team at NAL twice and scored a grand total of one goal in two games. Anybody from the ML 2027 team that the 2028 team would want will probably be trying out for NextLevel and DC Express.

That same TXN goalie got absolutely shelled in the 2nd half their pool play game

Their big middie is an offensive beast and was severely under used in that BBL game. If he leaves they’re not left with anyone that I saw that can even create a shot. Granted it was just one game but BBL really couldn’t stop the big middie. Their goalie came up big on him. That kid should get away from that coach and I’m sure everyone would want him. If the Hawks would get him they’d be almost impossible to beat. I detest seeing good players saddled with stunad coaches.

I think that this looks pretty accurate. I would probably put Texas Nationals in Group 1 and move Next Level to Group 2....FCA probably belongs in Group 3 (they're much better than Crabs and 2Way). Madlax beat Venom pretty convincingly earlier this summer so they belong in Group 1, although probably at the bottom of that group. Lots of similarities between the Madlax 2028 and 2024 teams.....biggest one is the coach. If he doesn't change his approach, he's headed down the same path.

With summer being biased, Next Level not ready for group 2. No tourney wins plus the first tourney drubbing. If they finished strong at a good tourney maybe but Hershey is not quality.

Boohoo. Madlax went 10-6 this spring and summer without the Texas kids. And their roster is still older than Hawks.

Agree, best group of middies but that Madlax middie is a stud but has zero help. He put a bounce shot through the net on us and had all of their goals in our OT win against them.

Ohhhhh, kinda like how all the Hawks/Madlax/Next Level kids who play for St Johns ran your 91 kids at St Anthony’s clean off the field this spring? Off their OWN field, mind you. Nah, 91 Venom is 1-2 against the DMV this spring. Blown out by Madlax and clipped by the Hawks. Likely to continue right through High School. See you in CT.

While they’re from 20 states, they are legitimately one of the top 5-6 teams— West Coast Starz

That bounce shot through the net was missed by the refs and goal wasn't counted. Goal should have counted and game never gone into overtime.

It’s one texas kid, not kids, and he’s a pole. While he’s a great player, he’s not that great a player. Give it a rest, the other 20 kids are pretty good

West Coast Starz performance this summer does not suggest they are anywhere near the top 5. need to show up at big tourneys and beat some top 5 teams to make that claim

I don't understand how parents let their kids play for that guy?? Is the exposure of Madlax that much better than Next Level/DC Express in the eyes of college coaches that convince parents/players to tough it out on those 2028/2024 teams? Enough rumors of daddy ball circulate to hold at least some validity as he coaches his kids on both of those teams I hear. Been playing against them for 3 years and it seems to get worse the older they get at least in the tight games that we always beat them in. No ML love here but sincere empathy for their parents/players.

Age of the kids aside, kudos to hawks and venom for bringing their normal teams and hanging/winning.

I guess I could include texas nationals but I don’t know if they have a set roster or not.

Just so you know, the Texas national team is a national team made up of local kids from various clubs. Just like a West Coast Starz or true National. Those kids play for centuries, Iron Horse, 3-D Dallas, etc. You can keep calling Madlax national team they have one, sometimes two kids playing for them in the summer. Which is quite common, a lot of kids from Florida and Texas who don’t see consistent competition traveled into the Northeast to play for a team in the summer…. it’s not a exclusive of 91, prime time, etc. I personally know a kid from Florida who plays for primetime.

Correct on texas nationals.

Advanc is an all star team of the northwest states and had kids from Long Island playing with them also at naptown.

The only teams that weren’t “national” or “all star” teams were hawks and venom.

But other than those 6 losses Madlax is undefeated.

They are likely the same age now roughly.

Hawks will be older once they bring down the other holdbacks. Probably oldest in country at that point?

Yeah, MadLax guy, if it makes you feel better, then keep telling yourself that NextLevel is two tiers below you. They are “lucky” every time they beat you. Three out of the last four have been “lucky” outings, if memory serves. Including at the “not quality” tourney they beat you at last summer. They are “lucky” when they win HoCo, including a dominating—er, “lucky”—performance in the semis. You don’t see Hawks people on here denigrating NL. Healthy respect should be the norm in an age group with a boatload of talent and parity. But you simply aren’t capable.

No more drop downs for the Hawks.