BOTC - US Lacrosse Community Forum Forums PENNSYLVANIA LACROSSE PENNSYLVANIA FORUM Duke's Lacrosse

“Nationals” is no longer part of dukes. Should probably refrain from discussing them in this forum.

nationals is G and everyone knows to run as fast as you can from him! the new premiere national is ebe helms attempt to fix the mess that is G

Lol sure. Nationals is only place to be

You must be new here

yeah G has a great reputation--just use the search function and see all the glowing reviews of him

Is a group using money orders and certified checks?

^^^^^^^^^^^

What is it with Philly lacrosse?
- HHH uses older players and gets kicked out of tournaments
- Brotherly Love heavily recruits players and then sits them
- Everyone has holdbacks, thus no one plays in WSYL at either 13U or 14U. NXT, Freedom, Team Ten, PA Roughriders, HHH, Rising Sons, Fusion, Brotherly Love. Not a single one. It's not like they don't want to or choose not to, they can't.
- Duke's reputation is terrible.

Philly continues to groom some great players - happy for the kids. The parents and club directors - not so much. It's just lacrosse, folks,

what's so special about the WSYL. it's just a 3 day tourney where some team from the island wins.
duke's rep is fine. G is the problem. That guy should be running a boiler room on Wall Street.
every region uses holdbacks (it's the main topic on conversation across this entire site).

Don't get me wrong, you bring up some good points.

WSYL isn't cheap and many teams have kids with summer birthdays that don't meet the cut off date and can't really be classified as holdbacks. Many teams hold tryouts for their WSYL teams, which seems to go against what it was supposed to have been about. Would have stunk to have been on a team and then told, you can't play as we're bringing in a couple others to take your normal spot for this tourney.

But aside from that, I wonder how many kids will reclass this year with Act 66 signed last week. Any thoughts?

I have no strong WSYL feelings (good event, but a lot of money), but it would have been nice for some of these teams to combine and rep the Philly area. Tigers obv showed well at 13U, but would have been nice to have more from the area. A few clubss: Fusion, Rising Sons and Brotherly Love aren't currently fielding top-level competitive teams at these ages and some clubs are only legit at one of these ages (Team Ten strong 25s and B level 26s, PA RR strong 26s and B level 25s), but it seems like a couple more teams could have been created if people cared enough about WSYL.

Sounds like Nationals has a huge turnout. Other group running way behind...no demand outside of the saps who have no choice?

Never a good demand signal when there is talk of adding MORE tryout dates.

Failure to launch, again?

NXT announced that they plan to take 2027s to WSYL this year.

Anybody can enter the qualifiers for WSYL. Does it actually increase tryout numbers and/or materially improve the team to do so...that is a serious question. Looking for parents who have gone through that process to provide some insight for the others on the board.

Like last year!

Anybody at the Premier Nationals tryout? If so, how’d it look? I imagine a pretty healthy rivalry with Nationals would be quick to follow! G vs Eb. I might pay to see something like that!

Interesting.

Yikes. Shots fired in this most uncivil war.

Actually, shedding the weight of G was the real challenge.

G is taking over at Bishop Sycamore

Real question about Nationals. Their teams won all 4 divisions at Nightfall in PA (‘26 - ‘29). Is this the new version of Duke’s Nationals, which was a disaster? I thought I read here that Nationals was started by the guy who was bad news & bad business for Duke’s.

Were these really national all-star teams? Coaches who were Duke’s coaches? Kids from…?

The Nationals is the surviving group with all the success from before and after.

Nationals is gonzos rebranding. advice would be to run from this guy!! worst reputation I've come across in youth lax

Think the other group might be the worst reputation. At least G hasnt gone under multiple times like the other group!

Think the other group might be the worst reputation. At least G hasnt gone under multiple times like the other group!

Look, G still has a lot of strong connections and as of right now has built some strong teams. Winning Nightfall not a big deal, not very strong competition. The only reason Nationals entered that tournament is they were having some tryouts in the area and wanted to show well so they beat up on some weaker teams. If you want to join a club where you have to travel 3 hours to get to a practice have at it but just about none of Phillys top players have joined Nationals. The only legit team Nationals has is there 27’s the other teams are OK but they are good. And didn’t I hear last week that G got Nationals banned from club nationals in Florida?

Ok

To be fair Nationals has a real operation and the other one hasn’t got off the ground ?

Yup, as I understand it they had players across divisions.

Why so?

Totally

You guys should stop living in the past and look at what Duke’s Elite has become now; their 24’s are studs, ton of them going to top DI programs, including Ivy Leagues. The younger teams (20028-2034) are easily the some of best teams in PA (2030’s top 10 nationally), arguably tops in the Nation.
Nationals are a showcase team. If you have a young boy in eastern PA, Duke’s Elite is the only place to be.

2026 Dukes Elite 215th in the country
2027 145th


Dukes Elite ... the only place to be for young boys

To be far all the teams are about the same.

2028-2034, you reference 26/27…hopefully your son is smarter. Prob not.

How are you even getting rankings on 2034's??? US Club Lacrosse only goes to 2028.
Oh I see this is just an ad for Duke's

US club lacrosse only rank the teams starting at 2028. So either you have a special ranking or you are BS.
I'm thinking you and your 29-34 rankings are BS and MESA/Team 10 are the place for younger kids

This is a Duke’s forum right?
Admittedly, my opinions are subjective, obviously, based on the teams/tourneys they are playing/beating.
I guess my point is, the program has changed significantly since the old days, for the better, and is def a place for young laxers to grow and succeed. Fair?

Fair and fair to see they [Censored] pot like the rest I guess.nothing special to much money just like guy above fro Mesa and team10.Laxers better shot playing hs and football and maybe get drafted to saintjoeies and nfl maybe if you know what I mean, be smart!