Games Today

[Seacoaster(1)]

1) Outside of Mass Elite and Grizzlies, girls club lax in the NE is pretty poor. And the best girls from those programs often want to go to top national schools.

2) A majority of Mass Elite players are prep school kids whose home is coast to coast so they don't necesarily have any affinity to the northeast

3) Lots of the prep school kids and Darien/New Canann kids are from families who are super focused on education. Often will choose NESCAC if they don't get offers from Ivies or high academic D1 (Duke/Stanford)

1) Oh, don't let the Laxachusetts or Gold Coast parents hear you say that, LOL.
2) Accurate - we know prep school girls from all over the country and many of them don't feel strong ties to New England.
3) Fair point, but I think another side of the coin is that players from Fairfield County and the prep schools are the ones whose parents went to NESCACs/Ivies themselves and can generally afford to pay full freight at those kinds of schools.

Looking at rosters for UConn, UMass, UVM, and UNH, most players are from the Northeast. There are a few prep school grads but most players are graduates of public or parochial high schools. I can see a New England flagship being appealing to a decent player who's a good student but isn't getting recruiting attention from the big name schools, and whose parents make too much for need-based aid but not enough be able to drop $90K+ per year to send their kid to Tufts or Dartmouth. They likely don't care so much that the red carpet isn't being rolled out by the school, because they're just not being pursued by the schools that can afford to roll out the red carpet.

Getting back to games! Speaking of two of those New England flagships, UConn finally has a win, 17-5 over UNH. I feel like New Hampshire was more successful under their previous HC.

New Hampshire was last successful under Sandy Bridgman. The Sarah Albrecht era resulted in a trough out of which UNH may never return. Abysmal recruiting, taciturn coaching, no outreach to the community. But they got the NU coaching tree compulsory shorts. Sad tidings all around.

Penn State coach has to be thinking about a career in insurance, maybe project management.

[Hello]

How can Hopkins stay so highly ranked after losing to Penn and only beating Gtown by 1?

[Brownlax]

Some interesting scores today:

Drexel takes down Penn State - Kudos to Drexel, but that should not be happening.

Hopkins beats Gtown by 1.

BU beats Stonehill by 1. BU should be a much better program. Great school with the ability to recruit New England and NY.

Elon with a nice win over ECU.

[Kleizaster]

Wow. Back to today’s games. St Joes just doubled up Villanova. Nova fell off a shelf as well. Kudos to St Joes for the hard schedule for the first few games. They are gonna go up in their RPI rankings 20 pts this year.

Penn State about to hang another L in the loss column. So what’s the odds this is Doherty’s last year?

i don't know what the heck is going on at Villanova. They were a program to watch in my opinion after some success and great recruiting classes. Everything seems to have regressed.

Penn State is done. Looking at their schedule, they won't win another game until they play Villanova, that's gonna be 6 straight losses. yikes. i think it's time for a coaching change

[Relax77]

Wow. Back to today’s games. St Joes just doubled up Villanova. Nova fell off a shelf as well. Kudos to St Joes for the hard schedule for the first few games. They are gonna go up in their RPI rankings 20 pts this year.

Penn State about to hang another L in the loss column. So what’s the odds this is Doherty’s last year?

i don't know what the heck is going on at Villanova. They were a program to watch in my opinion after some success and great recruiting classes. Everything seems to have regressed.

Penn State is done. Looking at their schedule, they won't win another game until they play Villanova, that's gonna be 6 straight losses. yikes. i think it's time for a coaching change

There is zero reasons. 0! That Penn State can’t compete in the Big Ten with the other schools. I said it a few days ago. They are in danger of a second 4 win season in just two years. She can’t keep her job. Has to go.

[Relax77]

Did anybody watch the JHU game? Squeaked by Gtown. Guess Ricky got sick of lax forums killing him.

[lacrossemwj]

Some interesting scores today:

Drexel takes down Penn State - Kudos to Drexel, but that should not be happening.

Hopkins beats Gtown by 1.

BU beats Stonehill by 1. BU should be a much better program. Great school with the ability to recruit New England and NY.

Elon with a nice win over ECU.

BU was 2-15 two years ago. I’m surprised they are doing as well as they are. Their recruiting has been a little bit all over the map.

[jff97]

Wow. Back to today’s games. St Joes just doubled up Villanova. Nova fell off a shelf as well. Kudos to St Joes for the hard schedule for the first few games. They are gonna go up in their RPI rankings 20 pts this year.

Penn State about to hang another L in the loss column. So what’s the odds this is Doherty’s last year?

i don't know what the heck is going on at Villanova. They were a program to watch in my opinion after some success and great recruiting classes. Everything seems to have regressed.

Penn State is done. Looking at their schedule, they won't win another game until they play Villanova, that's gonna be 6 straight losses. yikes. i think it's time for a coaching change

There is zero reasons. 0! That Penn State can’t compete in the Big Ten with the other schools. I said it a few days ago. They are in danger of a second 4 win season in just two years. She can’t keep her job. Has to go.

At this point it probably just depends what her contract situation is. Probably a coaching change sooner rather than later given their decline in recent years. Had an excellent few years nearly a decade ago as Northwestern was rebooting to establish themselves as the second best team in the B1G. Just fallen off big time since then.

[lax410]

Kinda interested in UMASS vs Holy cross. UMASS has played a tough schedule so far and are 0-2 but 2 very good losses to good teams. Hard to gauge how good they are after years of A10 domination

I’m going with UMASS by 5

I was surprised with UMASS score yesterday. While BC & Ivies are doing well, what has happened to other New England teams? UMASS and UCONN were the top 2 other teams last year and they 0-6. Fairfield was next last year and at least they are 3-1 after bad loss to Holy Cross. No other New England school was in top 50 last year. Is it the coaching or recruiting? Do the talented New England girls just want to leave the area? Are schools not vested in the sport? BC and Ivies excluded, seems New England teams haven’t been able to raise the level of play despite talented club and high school players.

A few thoughts

1) Outside of Mass Elite and Grizzlies, girls club lax in the NE is pretty poor. And the best girls from those programs often want to go to top national schools.

2) A majority of Mass Elite players are prep school kids whose home is coast to coast so they don't necesarily have any affinity to the northeast

3) Lots of the prep school kids and Darien/New Canann kids are from families who are super focused on education. Often will choose NESCAC if they don't get offers from Ivies or high academic D1 (Duke/Stanford)

I agree with #3, in that you do see NE kids going for high D1 or other “desirable” D1s and then high academic D3s in the northeast. D2s much less so. Which seems to differ from other parts of the country.

IME your points on 1 and 2 are both overstating it. There are other respectable clubs and some decidedly on the rise. I also disagree with #2.

I think the vibe generally is that state schools in the NE don’t have much cache. Going to UMass or UConn isn’t that special. So without an amazing lax reputation or a need to stay in state for $$, they’re not a huge draw for top players.

[suffolk]

Really bad week for the B10. It began with Maryland losing to Florida. Michigan struggling with Arizona State? Hopkins struggling against Georgetown, and Penn State is train wreck with a coach that is impossible to work for.

[Relax77]

Really bad week for the B10. It began with Maryland losing to Florida. Michigan struggling with Arizona State? Hopkins struggling against Georgetown, and Penn State is train wreck with a coach that is impossible to work for.

Love how IL and Lax Mag has PSU ranked pre season every year when they have been brutal for about 3 of the last 4 years. What did they magically think changed? Van Thof was gonna come in and what, change the offense? Missy was gonna listen to her offensive coach when she hasn’t done that ever. She ran off Grote who was probably her best OC in 8 years because she wouldn’t listen to her about running a different offensive set. As a PSU fan it is super frustrating. Hopefully this season will be the straw that broke the camels back. But I doubt it. She has that job until she no longer wants it.

[Womenslaxxfan]

ASU up 3-1 in the 2nd. Looks like they are cracking Michigan’s defense a little bit.

ASU looking good. up 5 - 3 against UM at the half. free streaming

https://pac-12.com/live/arizona-state-university

UM's offense is painful to watch. I'm extremely underwhelmed. Talks of them being top 5 should end after tonight.

+1

[MolonLaxe]

Really bad week for the B10. It began with Maryland losing to Florida. Michigan struggling with Arizona State? Hopkins struggling against Georgetown, and Penn State is train wreck with a coach that is impossible to work for.

Love how IL and Lax Mag has PSU ranked pre season every year when they have been brutal for about 3 of the last 4 years. What did they magically think changed? Van Thof was gonna come in and what, change the offense? Missy was gonna listen to her offensive coach when she hasn’t done that ever. She ran off Grote who was probably her best OC in 8 years because she wouldn’t listen to her about running a different offensive set. As a PSU fan it is super frustrating. Hopefully this season will be the straw that broke the camels back. But I doubt it. She has that job until she no longer wants it.

People voting for WLax are always myopic and they always seem stuck thinking about the teams from when they either played or got interested in the sport. Penn State gets a free pass because the people doing the poll want them to be good. It's also the same reason AMC at ILW always over hypes Cuse since she's an alum. There's not much objectivity in Women's Lacrosse because there aren't a lot of people covering the sport and there aren't a lot of people doing tons of articles with good research into rosters, players, etc. Just make a guess with terrible data sets.

[spidey44]

How can Hopkins stay so highly ranked after losing to Penn and only beating Gtown by 1?

Well last poll came out prior to yesterday's game so can't hold that against them. Penn is ranked 2 spots higher. Not saying Hop should be ranked as high as they are, but your argument doesn't really back that up.

[WLaxdad]

Kinda interested in UMASS vs Holy cross. UMASS has played a tough schedule so far and are 0-2 but 2 very good losses to good teams. Hard to gauge how good they are after years of A10 domination

I’m going with UMASS by 5

I was surprised with UMASS score yesterday. While BC & Ivies are doing well, what has happened to other New England teams? UMASS and UCONN were the top 2 other teams last year and they 0-6. Fairfield was next last year and at least they are 3-1 after bad loss to Holy Cross. No other New England school was in top 50 last year. Is it the coaching or recruiting? Do the talented New England girls just want to leave the area? Are schools not vested in the sport? BC and Ivies excluded, seems New England teams haven’t been able to raise the level of play despite talented club and high school players.

A few thoughts

1) Outside of Mass Elite and Grizzlies, girls club lax in the NE is pretty poor. And the best girls from those programs often want to go to top national schools.

2) A majority of Mass Elite players are prep school kids whose home is coast to coast so they don't necesarily have any affinity to the northeast

3) Lots of the prep school kids and Darien/New Canann kids are from families who are super focused on education. Often will choose NESCAC if they don't get offers from Ivies or high academic D1 (Duke/Stanford)

I agree with #3, in that you do see NE kids going for high D1 or other “desirable” D1s and then high academic D3s in the northeast. D2s much less so. Which seems to differ from other parts of the country.

IME your points on 1 and 2 are both overstating it. There are other respectable clubs and some decidedly on the rise. I also disagree with #2.

I think the vibe generally is that state schools in the NE don’t have much cache. Going to UMass or UConn isn’t that special. So without an amazing lax reputation or a need to stay in state for $$, they’re not a huge draw for top players.

I'm in the mid-atlantic but I also see things along the lines of #3. I will push for big brand or high academic D1 if available or high academic D3. The D2 schools don't have much of a brand IMO, I actually hope my daughter focuses on high academic D3 and doesn't even bother with the D1/D2 (of course they might not offer anyway ). Education should always be first and lax can be a fun 2nd.

[spidey44]

Really bad week for the B10. It began with Maryland losing to Florida. Michigan struggling with Arizona State? Hopkins struggling against Georgetown, and Penn State is train wreck with a coach that is impossible to work for.

Love how IL and Lax Mag has PSU ranked pre season every year when they have been brutal for about 3 of the last 4 years. What did they magically think changed? Van Thof was gonna come in and what, change the offense? Missy was gonna listen to her offensive coach when she hasn’t done that ever. She ran off Grote who was probably her best OC in 8 years because she wouldn’t listen to her about running a different offensive set. As a PSU fan it is super frustrating. Hopefully this season will be the straw that broke the camels back. But I doubt it. She has that job until she no longer wants it.

People voting for WLax are always myopic and they always seem stuck thinking about the teams from when they either played or got interested in the sport. Penn State gets a free pass because the people doing the poll want them to be good. It's also the same reason AMC at ILW always over hypes Cuse since she's an alum. There's not much objectivity in Women's Lacrosse because there aren't a lot of people covering the sport and there aren't a lot of people doing tons of articles with good research into rosters, players, etc. Just make a guess with terrible data sets.

Well said. And expect to see Duke in the preseason top 25 again next year as well

[watcherinthewoods]

Really bad week for the B10. It began with Maryland losing to Florida. Michigan struggling with Arizona State? Hopkins struggling against Georgetown, and Penn State is train wreck with a coach that is impossible to work for.

Love how IL and Lax Mag has PSU ranked pre season every year when they have been brutal for about 3 of the last 4 years. What did they magically think changed? Van Thof was gonna come in and what, change the offense? Missy was gonna listen to her offensive coach when she hasn’t done that ever. She ran off Grote who was probably her best OC in 8 years because she wouldn’t listen to her about running a different offensive set. As a PSU fan it is super frustrating. Hopefully this season will be the straw that broke the camels back. But I doubt it. She has that job until she no longer wants it.

People voting for WLax are always myopic and they always seem stuck thinking about the teams from when they either played or got interested in the sport. Penn State gets a free pass because the people doing the poll want them to be good. It's also the same reason AMC at ILW always over hypes Cuse since she's an alum. There's not much objectivity in Women's Lacrosse because there aren't a lot of people covering the sport and there aren't a lot of people doing tons of articles with good research into rosters, players, etc. Just make a guess with terrible data sets.

The lax media never seems to let facts get in the way of a good story ... witness the complete misstatement below from today's article on Princeton. Ivy players DO NOT sign an NLI. Get a fact checker, people.

... And the Tigers did win in Blake’s first year. Inspired by Sailer’s grand finale and led by all-timers in attacker Kyla Sears, goalie Sam Fish and defender/draw leader Marge Donovan, the Tigers sent their legendary coach and players off with another league title and a first-round NCAA tournament win over UMass. It was precisely what Blake signed up for when she signed her name on her National Letter of Intent ...

[Seacoaster(1)]

NU up 3-1 early. BC having some trouble getting the ball inside at all. BC needed that first goal.

Love the venue.

7-2. Not sure BC has an answer to this offense, save for keeping it from getting the ball.

[Relax77]

Popped in and the score was 8-5. The last three possessions have been insanely sloppy. You would think these top teams wouldn’t be making these mistakes. I mean one girl threw the ball ten feet ahead of her while she was cradling. As I’m writing this another NU turnover. Just the five minutes I watched it should be tied up right now.

[wlaxphan20]

Popped in and the score was 8-5. The last three possessions have been insanely sloppy. You would think these top teams wouldn’t be making these mistakes. I mean one girl threw the ball ten feet ahead of her while she was cradling. As I’m writing this another NU turnover. Just the five minutes I watched it should be tied up right now.

Popped in half way through the second quarter too. BC getting some good turnovers on the ride but can’t quite finish them. Definitely some weird sloppy stuff going on. It has definitely felt hectic.