New England West 2021

[3rdPersonPlural]

Has anybody figured out who is all league for 2019????

(This is an inside joke for the true believer. If you don't get it, stick around. You will.....)

As I have every year since I joined the prior mother ship as WhichCoast in 2004, I stubbornly predict that my beloved Taft Rhinos will take the Founders League and the NEW I League with an undefeated season. I have rarely been right on either prediction, to be honest.

However I suspect the following will be true:

* 'wick and 'bury will be in the conversation when 'best team in the nation' is discussed
* Deerfield will beat one of these teams. Knowing smirks all around. Deerfield will be ranked everywhere as a top 1% team. Nationally.
* If Nasty's kid hasn't graduated yet, we'll get optimistic pre-season reports on the Pride, and only slightly biased first-hand reports on their games.
* Choate will surprise. Westminster will win a game no one thought they would. Loomis will overachieve. The Hoggers will meet expectations.
* Live Streams will only be live. Replays verboten. Someone will post a link to a free app that records live streams. (OK, that's me being hopeful..)
* 'wick will show up in a GEICO event.
* Someone will get a PG that makes all pre-season predictions moot.

[Justafan]

Deerfield wins it in 2020.

Hope for really good OOC schedules. Love going to those games.

Would like to see a New England West 1 end of season tournament.

[Justafan]

Deerfield wins it in 2020.

Hope for really good OOC schedules. Love going to those games.

Would like to see a New England West 1 end of season tournament.

Oh, and please add the shot clock.

[RumorMill]

Always interesting to see what PG's are brought in along with transferring sophomores and juniors.

I'm looking for AOF to have a strong year. They return a lot of starters (Goalie, FOGO, 2 attack and a number of middies). Will need to replace a strong Close D core, but if they bring in a couple key pieces they could be shaping up to contend with top in the league.

[RumorMill]

https://www.insidelacrosse.com/article/ ... lass/55177

Probably won't hit Salisbury too hard, but still a change to what coach probably anticipated for his starting attack!

[pcowlax]

No idea of the circumstances here but on the surface an odd move. Switch from attending Duke, and playing with his brother, to Lehigh (no disrespect but not a comparable school). Maybe he never really wanted to do the PG year but had been told by Duke he had to and now Lehigh offered him to come this year? How is this even possible though? When did actually apply to Lehigh? He is not a transfer, there is a set and way past designated application period. Weird.

[HopFan16]

Salisbury is getting two transfers in from St. Michael's in Canada: Johnathan Peshko and Jakson Raposo—both middies ranked in the top 100 by Inside Lacrosse. Should provide a nice offensive boost. Peshko is a towering 6'4'' middie who can shoot from inside and out while Raposo is smaller but a very slick dodger with stick skills. Both kids played junior A this summer.

[RumorMill]

No idea of the circumstances here but on the surface an odd move. Switch from attending Duke, and playing with his brother, to Lehigh (no disrespect but not a comparable school). Maybe he never really wanted to do the PG year but had been told by Duke he had to and now Lehigh offered him to come this year? How is this even possible though? When did actually apply to Lehigh? He is not a transfer, there is a set and way past designated application period. Weird.

pcow, completely agree. However in this day and age, it no longer surprises me. Essentially, if you're good enough and the "institution" wants/needs you, you can write your own rules. AOF had one last year as well, dropped out of AOF and enrolled in college after the school year already started!

Also agree that a Duke degree is potentially worth the PG year... but different strokes as they say.

[PrimeTime21]

Deerfield is missing the dawgs to actually win. Too soft, not enough depth, bad environment. Until they replace the top administration and get rid of the “safe space” vibe DA ain’t scaring anybody legit.

Deerfield lost to a California public school. Talk about coasting on past rep.

[DALaxDad]

Let's see, is it better to call out a troll or ignore a troll? I'm going with ignoring today.

[PrimeTime21]

Deerfield is the new AOF. Tons of preseason hype. An afterthought by week 2.

It hasn’t been the same since they made their changes. It is what it is.

[pcowlax]

Deerfield played in Session A, i.e. the vastly more competitive one, in the High School Showcase this summer and crushed all comers, including Chaminade and MIAA teams. Yes, it is a summer tournament but most teams brought their full squads and played it much more straight than a usual scrimmage or summer ball game. It wasn't a safe space for anyone they were playing, that is for sure.

[MA Lax Fan]

Are there league rules around athletic scholarships at the NEWest schools? Can some of the schools with bigger endowments just field a team with elite scholarship athletes?

I know some schools are definitely giving out $50-$60 thousand if you are a future D1 commit. Just wondering if there are rules in the league regarding paying for “ringers” and how many athletic scholarships you can provide.

I would think some of the schools with shallower pockets would want some guidelines in place.

Thanks.

[PrimeTime21]

Are there league rules around athletic scholarships at the NEWest schools? Can some of the schools with bigger endowments just field a team with elite scholarship athletes?

I know some schools are definitely giving out $50-$60 thousand if you are a future D1 commit. Just wondering if there are rules in the league regarding paying for “ringers” and how many athletic scholarships you can provide.

I would think some of the schools with shallower pockets would want some guidelines in place.

Thanks.

“Need” is very relative my dude. Somebody might “need” a FOGO and they’ll make the paperwork add up.

The thing is they don’t touch endowments for this. It’s all new money “annual fund” aka slush fund. For every guy getting a free ride you need 3-4 suckers paying sticker plus.

If the pool of marks shrinks the math gets tough.

[TopShelf585]

No idea of the circumstances here but on the surface an odd move. Switch from attending Duke, and playing with his brother, to Lehigh (no disrespect but not a comparable school). Maybe he never really wanted to do the PG year but had been told by Duke he had to and now Lehigh offered him to come this year? How is this even possible though? When did actually apply to Lehigh? He is not a transfer, there is a set and way past designated application period. Weird.

May have something to do with SA's Brendan O'Neil switching to Duke from PSU?
He'd would be going in as a 2020 (after PG year) and competing against O'Neil for that same lefty attack spot.

If I wanted a chance to play and not sit behind O'Neil for four years I might just make that same decision.
That said- he'll be sitting behind Andrew Pettit at Lehigh this year.

[ctbagataway]

To bring this thread back to one of our favorite off-season topics (the other being PG's/transfers), I just read that the ISL is going to a two-tiered playoff system in 2020. With 16 teams in the league, the ISL seems to have found a format that works. Let the excuses begin about why the NE West 1 can't get it done.

[3rdPersonPlural]

I'll bite, Bagataway

The lacrosse season can't begin until the beginning of spring break, and this spring break 'season' is on the road playing games that look more like scrimmages.

After that, teams can only legitimately play Wednesdays and Saturdays. I know that there are some Friday night games now, but those replace the traditional Saturday games. This means a limited number of games between spring break and graduation.

If we lop off the last 2 games from the schedule, the amount of game slots available for OOC jousts is compressed to zero.

The question, then, is should we advocate for more OOC games or a playoff? We can't have both.

I'm firmly in the OOC camp.

[pcowlax]

We lop off NMH for starters. That game provides absolutely nothing to the teams that play them, is an embarrassment to the league and is unfair to the Hogger players who are put in an impossible position whereas they could be very competitive and still play some quality teams in WEST-2. If we are looking for a 4 team playoff that means only one game needs to be added to the schedule of 2 teams. I am sure that is doable without dropping any OOC despite the Wed/Sat structure and spring break/late start/graduation restrictions. ISL is going to a somewhat tiered regular season to maximize competitive balance. Now, with something like 15 league games this was long overdue as that schedule was crazy with several uncompetitive teams preventing the top teams from playing virtually any OOC. Not suggesting WEST-1 do something fully like that but, if NMH is dropped, and if somehow, someway is too hard to add 1 game for two teams, the likely top 4-6 teams each year could also not play Kent, which would play a blended West-1/2 schedule, which they almost kind of do now and would also result in them having more competitive games. This would ensure whoever made the playoffs didn't have to add a game. Problem solved, lets go.

[beastboyz99]

Like every new year, it's always a toss-up with how teams react to the graduated class + new guys coming in on the team + younger guys coming up through the program. Bury has been re-loading like no one else these past few years, so it would be my guess they will be another contender this year especially with some young talent they already had. DA has been a question mark these past few seasons with a lot of changes going on with the school and Bury dominating the recruiting scene for NE 1 West boarding. Should be interesting to see what they can do. I wouldn't sleep on AOF completely this year with some young guys who are some of the best. Wick always seems to be towards the top with all the talent they have. By far the deepest team in the league consistently. Only question is at the goalie spot, which they have always had a top stopper. The league will be very strong this year, as it has been the past few years. Hopefully, we can ring out a national #1 ranked team this year.

[Laxxal22]

Thoughts on Taft’s chances this year? Some nice PGs and really impressive commitments from the junior class so far. Think they have the juice to win the league?