THE 2019 Hopkins Lacrosse Fallout Shelter (44, we want more!)

[steel_hop]

I have no association with Hop or the program. I am just a fan of the sport and admirer of the program.

A few thoughts:

1. If Hopkins moves on from Coach Petro, he will have another job before he makes it to his car in the parking lot. I liken his free agency to that of John Harbaugh's if the Ravens had moved on from him. Their resumes are incredibly impressive and programs around the country would line up to hire them.

I don't really disagree with this view at all. Sometimes it is just better for all parties to move on. There becomes a level of complenancy on all parties. Same thing happened to Andy Reid and the Eagles. It worked out for the Eagles. I doubt any Eagles fan, event he Reid supporters, would even argue that it didn't. It certainly could mean you have your version of Chip Kelly but that just gets you a Doug Pederson. Andy Reid has moved on and become very successful with the Chiefs (and should have played in the SB last year).

2. If ya let him go, who ya gonna hire? Presumably you are hiring someone that can take the program back to a perennial Final Four/National Championship contender. Who can do that for you? And how much time does that person receive to do the job? (Remember-they commit kids so early you need 6 years to get a roster full of your own players.)

This is the fallacy of the fear of change. Maybe it turns bad but doing nothing is not working. 1 FF in 11 years isn't getting it done (Well, Penn guys think it would be okay, but, this is Hopkins). Also, there is no more early recruiting and UVA seemed to have figured it out in 3 years and this was with early recruiting.

3. It is an apples to oranges comparison, but how does Janine still have a job if you are firing Petro? She has accomplished essentially nothing as the head coach there in terms of NCAA Tournament play. Do you do a "Penn State" circa 2010 and fire both men's and women's lacrosse coaches at the same time and revamp your lacrosse programs? It has certainly paid off for them (Tambroni and Doherty).

For the exact reason, you started this paragraph. Tucker is in a completely different position than Petro. The women's program doesn't have a history of national titles. This doesn't lend itself to get the players that dreamed of playing at Homewood and the 44 titles. There wouldn't be top end coaches thinking about taking the job if it was open. She is under much less scrutiny - there isn't even a Hopkins specific thread over on the Women's pages and, well, we are 173 pages and counting for 2019.

Further, the women's program was only really building at the D3 level when it moved to D1. Her goal is to move the program forward and compete in DI and make the tournament. She has also had the issues of moving from D3 to D1 from ECAC to ALC to B1G, so the quality of her opponents have increased over the years.

I won't argue with the view her accomplishments are less than Petros. I also won't argue that if Petro's fired that it shine's light on her situation. But, I also think she is working with a totally different set of parameters. That isn't to say if she was fired I'd be upset but I wouldn't lose sleep over it.

4. How are you determining that the Hopkins program is underachieving? Are you comparing it to other schools? If so, what schools are you using as the benchmark---what schools in D1 lacrosse have the similar academic profile, exist in a hotbed, etc.? And, once you can say what schools are equivalent, how have their programs faired over the past 9-10 years (the time period you have been unhappy with Petro).

It is a comparison to other top lacrosse schools. Every school has numerous pros and cons associated with it what binds those teams together is regularly competing for national titles or has historically competed for national titles. You can list them out: UMd, UNC, UVA, SU, Duke, Denver and I would qualify the last team as simply as IVY.

I mean by saying Ivy is that the conference seams to have runs of different dominate teams so IVY would be an amalgamation of Princeton, Cornell, Brown and Yale.

As I said, if Hopkins had a similar run to Denver's last 10 years, there wouldn't be the issue there is right now.

5. Lastly, are you truly prepared to move on from a man that: is an alum, deeply cares about his players, has won two national championships, coached in four national championship games, and coached in seven final fours, and has an overall record of 205-89?

The 2 championships and 4 title games were over a decade ago. 6 of his 7 final four appearance ago were over a decade ago. His record from 2001 to 2008 was 96 and 25 (.793 win percentage). From 2009 to 2019 he is 109 and 64 (.630 win percentage). The 2019 senior class has an overall win percentage of .571. I don't even have to go into the record books to know that is the worst record ever over a 4 year period at Hopkins.

So, yes. It is time to move on.

[steel_hop]

^^^ Excellent points. Very Hopkins/specific points/concerns/issues.

Now layer on the macro issues of how the lacrosse world has changed over the last 15-20 years. How recruiting has changed. The increase and democratization of talent. Growth, etc.

Until Hopkins discovers the "why" good players are choosing other schools over them, they will regress to the mean in terms of performance---like most every other team in the country does/has. And they haven't regressed to the mean yet. The last 10 years of Hopkins lacrosse have been pretty good by any standard---except for the expectations of the Hopkin's faithful.

Again, maybe for Penn the last 10 years would have been pretty good but not by anyone Hopkins support would they say it was pretty good.

[steel_hop]

Interesting ... Coach Petro retweeted this Lou Holtz quote about 19 hours ago:

Life is ten percent what happens to you and ninety percent how you respond to it. -Lou Holtz

DocBarrister

I don't think it means much. He has these types of quotes in his twitter feed all the time.

[jhu06]

I agree with every word of steelhops post above. you take the acc, and maryland-Hopkins peer group and stack them up over the last decade and say how does Hopkins rank? Ahead of what, maybe syracuse-that's it. then you add in the yales, towsons, loyolas, denvers and now penn states that have flashed and Petro has made 1 coaching staff change-adding the goalie coach who doesn't seem to have made any difference and you say correctly as steel hop points out-can they find a coach who can do better than .571 winning percentage and if the answer isn't yes, the ad needs to go too. Dwans defenses have been a disaster may in may out in critical games for the most part.

As for the womens coach-look at all the schools in the womens game from stony brook to james madison to florida having wild success and you ask yourself why can't a Hopkins womens program be a perennial ff contender too? Northwestern has similar academics and did just fine for years. I don't care about that program but the standards need to be just as high.

Kuhn, marr-who cost them the penn state game, danny jones-too much of a hot head for a sr leader. No I won't miss them because the win/loss results speak for themselves. There was a severe lack of leadership in that lockerroom and on that field this year-and the runs teams made against Hopkins were a testament to that. Petro who is better at deflection and saying nothing than bill belichick which is saying something constantly pointed to the mental miscues and not playing 60 minutes. That's on the players losing focus and the leaders not setting an example. marr and jones in particular showed severe breakdowns in emotional maturity setting an awful standard for the rest of the program.

[MDlaxfan76]

Perhaps it’s just me, but one thing that Hop fans might want to consider is a look in the mirror.

At what point does the level of criticism of individual players make Hopkins a toxic place to play ball?

Just as we wonder whether a screamer coach can cause a level of toxicity, are fan criticisms creating a barrier?

Yes, yes, the level of attention comes with the turf when playing for a storied program, and there’s no more storied program than Hopkins! But ask yourself at what point does negativity get in the way of playing with joy?

Lacrosse is a sport best played with joy, not fear.

[HopFan16]

Kuhn, marr-who cost them the penn state game, danny jones-too much of a hot head for a sr leader. No I won't miss them because the win/loss results speak for themselves.

If you're not going to miss Kuhn then you're even more obtuse than previously thought. You're in a for a rude awakening next year regarding the LSM position. That's one spot on the field that is likely to get worse, not better. 14 goals, 21 points and 115 groundballs, 4-year starter at a position with unclear depth...you may not "miss" him but the team almost certainly will and please don't come crying to this thread when the next man up isn't as good. Because we all know you will, like clockwork. Your insistence on calling out specific players by name in every post and treating them like they personally owe you something is pretty pathological at this point. I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that Rob Kuhn is a lot more respected and valued in the Hopkins lacrosse community than "jhu06." Show of hands—anyone going to miss this guy if he just suddenly stops posting one day? Outside of maybe SteelHop my guess is nah but even he generally directs his criticism toward the guys getting paid to run the team and not the student-athletes.

[LaxPundit07]

I have no association with Hop or the program. I am just a fan of the sport and admirer of the program.

A few thoughts:

1. If Hopkins moves on from Coach Petro, he will have another job before he makes it to his car in the parking lot. I liken his free agency to that of John Harbaugh's if the Ravens had moved on from him. Their resumes are incredibly impressive and programs around the country would line up to hire them.

I don't really disagree with this view at all. Sometimes it is just better for all parties to move on. There becomes a level of complenancy on all parties. Same thing happened to Andy Reid and the Eagles. It worked out for the Eagles. I doubt any Eagles fan, event he Reid supporters, would even argue that it didn't. It certainly could mean you have your version of Chip Kelly but that just gets you a Doug Pederson. Andy Reid has moved on and become very successful with the Chiefs (and should have played in the SB last year).

2. If ya let him go, who ya gonna hire? Presumably you are hiring someone that can take the program back to a perennial Final Four/National Championship contender. Who can do that for you? And how much time does that person receive to do the job? (Remember-they commit kids so early you need 6 years to get a roster full of your own players.)

This is the fallacy of the fear of change. Maybe it turns bad but doing nothing is not working. 1 FF in 11 years isn't getting it done (Well, Penn guys think it would be okay, but, this is Hopkins). Also, there is no more early recruiting and UVA seemed to have figured it out in 3 years and this was with early recruiting.

3. It is an apples to oranges comparison, but how does Janine still have a job if you are firing Petro? She has accomplished essentially nothing as the head coach there in terms of NCAA Tournament play. Do you do a "Penn State" circa 2010 and fire both men's and women's lacrosse coaches at the same time and revamp your lacrosse programs? It has certainly paid off for them (Tambroni and Doherty).

For the exact reason, you started this paragraph. Tucker is in a completely different position than Petro. The women's program doesn't have a history of national titles. This doesn't lend itself to get the players that dreamed of playing at Homewood and the 44 titles. There wouldn't be top end coaches thinking about taking the job if it was open. She is under much less scrutiny - there isn't even a Hopkins specific thread over on the Women's pages and, well, we are 173 pages and counting for 2019.

Further, the women's program was only really building at the D3 level when it moved to D1. Her goal is to move the program forward and compete in DI and make the tournament. She has also had the issues of moving from D3 to D1 from ECAC to ALC to B1G, so the quality of her opponents have increased over the years.

I won't argue with the view her accomplishments are less than Petros. I also won't argue that if Petro's fired that it shine's light on her situation. But, I also think she is working with a totally different set of parameters. That isn't to say if she was fired I'd be upset but I wouldn't lose sleep over it.

4. How are you determining that the Hopkins program is underachieving? Are you comparing it to other schools? If so, what schools are you using as the benchmark---what schools in D1 lacrosse have the similar academic profile, exist in a hotbed, etc.? And, once you can say what schools are equivalent, how have their programs faired over the past 9-10 years (the time period you have been unhappy with Petro).

It is a comparison to other top lacrosse schools. Every school has numerous pros and cons associated with it what binds those teams together is regularly competing for national titles or has historically competed for national titles. You can list them out: UMd, UNC, UVA, SU, Duke, Denver and I would qualify the last team as simply as IVY.

I mean by saying Ivy is that the conference seams to have runs of different dominate teams so IVY would be an amalgamation of Princeton, Cornell, Brown and Yale.

As I said, if Hopkins had a similar run to Denver's last 10 years, there wouldn't be the issue there is right now.

5. Lastly, are you truly prepared to move on from a man that: is an alum, deeply cares about his players, has won two national championships, coached in four national championship games, and coached in seven final fours, and has an overall record of 205-89?

The 2 championships and 4 title games were over a decade ago. 6 of his 7 final four appearance ago were over a decade ago. His record from 2001 to 2008 was 96 and 25 (.793 win percentage). From 2009 to 2019 he is 109 and 64 (.630 win percentage). The 2019 senior class has an overall win percentage of .571. I don't even have to go into the record books to know that is the worst record ever over a 4 year period at Hopkins.

So, yes. It is time to move on.

The schools you are comparing Hopkins to are NOT Hopkins. By every measurable available, they are BETTER. They are BCS. They have football. They have big money. The list goes on. Hopkins is NOT UVA, Maryland, UNC, etc. They were equivalents from a lacrosse perspective many years ago, but with the growth of the sport came the growth of BCS schools in and supporting the sport. Which is EXACTLY why Hopkins joining the Big Ten was a problem. They do not have the resources their Big Ten counterparts do. They would be better off in the Patriot or Colonial; where you can see comparable schools like Loyola and Towson competing and succeeding.

The basis of your unrest is that Hopkins isn't performing on the level of UVA, MD, UNC, etc. You know why they are not performing like them? Because THEY are not THEM! You aren't being fair to your coach, players, and school.

[HopFan16]

Which is EXACTLY why Hopkins joining the Big Ten was a problem. They do not have the resources their Big Ten counterparts do. They would be better off in the Patriot or Colonial; where you can see comparable schools like Loyola and Towson competing and succeeding.

This is a new one. Since joining the Big Ten, Hopkins is 21-12 in the conference (including playoffs), has been to 3 of 5 championship games (and never worse than the #3 seed) and has won 2 of those. They seem to be doing just fine competing in the conference with the resources that they have, which are considerable and quite comparable to that of their counterparts in the Big Ten. Just because these teams are big football schools doesn't mean their lacrosse teams are getting huge influxes of money to play around with. And just because Hopkins is NOT one of those schools does not mean that the lacrosse program is not adequately funded to compete with them. It is, and they are.

[Hoponboard]

No Owen Murphy in the UA AA fourth wave. So Tim Marcille is our only representative. Maybe, this is a good contrary indicator for the 2019 class.

[primitiveskills]

I have no association with Hop or the program. I am just a fan of the sport and admirer of the program.

A few thoughts:

1. If Hopkins moves on from Coach Petro, he will have another job before he makes it to his car in the parking lot. I liken his free agency to that of John Harbaugh's if the Ravens had moved on from him. Their resumes are incredibly impressive and programs around the country would line up to hire them.

I don't really disagree with this view at all. Sometimes it is just better for all parties to move on. There becomes a level of complenancy on all parties. Same thing happened to Andy Reid and the Eagles. It worked out for the Eagles. I doubt any Eagles fan, event he Reid supporters, would even argue that it didn't. It certainly could mean you have your version of Chip Kelly but that just gets you a Doug Pederson. Andy Reid has moved on and become very successful with the Chiefs (and should have played in the SB last year).

2. If ya let him go, who ya gonna hire? Presumably you are hiring someone that can take the program back to a perennial Final Four/National Championship contender. Who can do that for you? And how much time does that person receive to do the job? (Remember-they commit kids so early you need 6 years to get a roster full of your own players.)

This is the fallacy of the fear of change. Maybe it turns bad but doing nothing is not working. 1 FF in 11 years isn't getting it done (Well, Penn guys think it would be okay, but, this is Hopkins). Also, there is no more early recruiting and UVA seemed to have figured it out in 3 years and this was with early recruiting.

3. It is an apples to oranges comparison, but how does Janine still have a job if you are firing Petro? She has accomplished essentially nothing as the head coach there in terms of NCAA Tournament play. Do you do a "Penn State" circa 2010 and fire both men's and women's lacrosse coaches at the same time and revamp your lacrosse programs? It has certainly paid off for them (Tambroni and Doherty).

For the exact reason, you started this paragraph. Tucker is in a completely different position than Petro. The women's program doesn't have a history of national titles. This doesn't lend itself to get the players that dreamed of playing at Homewood and the 44 titles. There wouldn't be top end coaches thinking about taking the job if it was open. She is under much less scrutiny - there isn't even a Hopkins specific thread over on the Women's pages and, well, we are 173 pages and counting for 2019.

Further, the women's program was only really building at the D3 level when it moved to D1. Her goal is to move the program forward and compete in DI and make the tournament. She has also had the issues of moving from D3 to D1 from ECAC to ALC to B1G, so the quality of her opponents have increased over the years.

I won't argue with the view her accomplishments are less than Petros. I also won't argue that if Petro's fired that it shine's light on her situation. But, I also think she is working with a totally different set of parameters. That isn't to say if she was fired I'd be upset but I wouldn't lose sleep over it.

4. How are you determining that the Hopkins program is underachieving? Are you comparing it to other schools? If so, what schools are you using as the benchmark---what schools in D1 lacrosse have the similar academic profile, exist in a hotbed, etc.? And, once you can say what schools are equivalent, how have their programs faired over the past 9-10 years (the time period you have been unhappy with Petro).

It is a comparison to other top lacrosse schools. Every school has numerous pros and cons associated with it what binds those teams together is regularly competing for national titles or has historically competed for national titles. You can list them out: UMd, UNC, UVA, SU, Duke, Denver and I would qualify the last team as simply as IVY.

I mean by saying Ivy is that the conference seams to have runs of different dominate teams so IVY would be an amalgamation of Princeton, Cornell, Brown and Yale.

As I said, if Hopkins had a similar run to Denver's last 10 years, there wouldn't be the issue there is right now.

5. Lastly, are you truly prepared to move on from a man that: is an alum, deeply cares about his players, has won two national championships, coached in four national championship games, and coached in seven final fours, and has an overall record of 205-89?

The 2 championships and 4 title games were over a decade ago. 6 of his 7 final four appearance ago were over a decade ago. His record from 2001 to 2008 was 96 and 25 (.793 win percentage). From 2009 to 2019 he is 109 and 64 (.630 win percentage). The 2019 senior class has an overall win percentage of .571. I don't even have to go into the record books to know that is the worst record ever over a 4 year period at Hopkins.

So, yes. It is time to move on.

The schools you are comparing Hopkins to are NOT Hopkins. By every measurable available, they are BETTER. They are BCS. They have football. They have big money. The list goes on. Hopkins is NOT UVA, Maryland, UNC, etc. They were equivalents from a lacrosse perspective many years ago, but with the growth of the sport came the growth of BCS schools in and supporting the sport. Which is EXACTLY why Hopkins joining the Big Ten was a problem. They do not have the resources their Big Ten counterparts do. They would be better off in the Patriot or Colonial; where you can see comparable schools like Loyola and Towson competing and succeeding.

The basis of your unrest is that Hopkins isn't performing on the level of UVA, MD, UNC, etc. You know why they are not performing like them? Because THEY are not THEM! You aren't being fair to your coach, players, and school.

You make the argument that Hopkins can't compete with the B1G, yet they've won the championship twice and been a finalist 3 times in 5 years. The athletic department resources argument is flawed; if that were the case it would be Ohio State, Michigan, Penn State, Notre Dame, and then everyone else straggling way behind. Having Power 5 financial largesse can help, but can also be a curse for non-revenue sports. When football and basketball are floundering, the non-revenue sports can feel the pain. You also note the success of Loyola and Towson. Are they doing it based off resources? I don't think so.

[51percentcorn]

Now we are going after Janine Tucker? Good Lord

Robert Kuhn - extremely threatening in transition - I'll leave it to someone that actually knows what he is talking about to evaluate his on ball defensive abilities. The stat sheet is actually not eye popping for an LSM except for his offensive stats - he was basically a 28 GB and 9 CTOs per year. That is less than 2 ground balls a game and less than 1 CTO per game. For someone on the wings for over half the face-offs and the #1 LSM that's not off the charts by any stretch. Not saying we had anyone better.

'06 does tend to be a little arrogant in his posts - with mistakes - anybody calling the Hopkins defense Dwan's defense needs the meds adjusted. That is 100% Petro through and through

There is absolutely no question the pre-Rabil era and the post-Rabil eras under Petro have been vastly different. Yes the landscape of the game has shifted but did he adapt as well as he could have? Did he choose the right strategies?

I remain steadfast that the biggest mistake was the 100% absolute no holds barred commitment to early recruiting. It has created the direct and indirect issues that in my opinion the team is struggling with:

- Pure misses - kids that excel in a summer league game at 13/14 years old might not be the best players by the time they are 17/18 playing against real competition in high school - conversely you also have the type II error - you miss the kid in the upper class of high school that would kill himself to play for Hopkins because you're off watching the 8th graders play

- Size issues - again - not even coming close to claiming that smaller/quicker players can't excel at the game - but it is probably not the best strategy to role out 6 mid-fielders and only one of them is anywhere near 6 ft. tall - that is until Zinn started to play some - when someone is 5'7" 140 lbs soaking wet at 14 years old he might not get much bigger - you can't be sure. Trying to predict human growth is a bad way to go to begin with - starting at freshmen in high school exacerbates the issue a thousand fold

- Roster Size - you compensate for the uncertainty of recruiting such younger players by recruiting MORE of them on the likely theory that some of them will be very good players and you'll manage the fall-out. This - to my mind - creates a host of issues I have already laid out before - managing 50+ players when the magic number is 23 means over half the team will essentially never see the field. I can't imagine that's an unbelievable experience for all. It also means that some recruits you might be interested in and they might reciprocate their interest will never consider Hopkins because there is already 10 guys in front of them, e.g. maybe young Mr. Morrill would have been more interested in Hopkins even with Shack if there weren't a whole nest full of other attackmen around - one of Shack's most successful seasons was his freshmen campaign when he was much more a wing player with his brother handling the ball more. Does this have any role in player development? - when you have to run 53 guys through a 2 hour practice - and you know for half the team practice is the only time they will be on the field are the guys that need the reps getting them?

- Decommits/transfers/etc. - While all programs have these issues - and I admittedly have no data to back this up - but like HF16 and his sense that Hopkins takes longer to get into the offense under the shot clock it appears to me that Hopkins suffers more from this issue than most programs.

- Roster Construction - related to the roster size, player size and timing of securing verbals - this is how you end up with so many converted attackmen and if you consider DeSimone a high school attackman - that means you don't have a non freshmen middie that wasn't a converted attakmen (except for maybe Stagnitta) How does that happen? How - if Foley really comes back - could you end up with theoretically 15+ people carrying 6 ft poles. Stop me if I am wrong but I think only 4 can play at a time. This is also how you recruit - as I pointed out before - 4 guys
Murphy/Cohen/Chauvette (yes I know he is now a year behind)/Angelus that are all attack and are all almost exactly the same size. I hope - more than hope Murphy is a Blue Jay version of Mac the Knife but you don't need 4 of them.

Drives me nuts - again please don't point to Tinney and Epstein and say early recruiting was not an issue - I already gave what I consider to be a perfect analogy - if you didn't like that one - it's akin to a broken clock being right twice a day

Go back and listen to that podcast before the tournament - Petro basically admits early recruiting was a mistake.

Obviously I will never be the coach at Johns Hopkins but parents would hate it if I was - the roster would be under 40 in 2/3 years.

[primitiveskills]

No Owen Murphy in the UA AA fourth wave. So Tim Marcille is our only representative. Maybe, this is a good contrary indicator for the 2019 class.

I suspect we'll survive without the Ty-and-Booker political favorites collection.

[steel_hop]

Now we are going after Janine Tucker? Good Lord

Robert Kuhn - extremely threatening in transition - I'll leave it to someone that actually knows what he is talking about to evaluate his on ball defensive abilities. The stat sheet is actually not eye popping for an LSM except for his offensive stats - he was basically a 28 GB and 9 CTOs per year. That is less than 2 ground balls a game and less than 1 CTO per game. For someone on the wings for over half the face-offs and the #1 LSM that's not off the charts by any stretch. Not saying we had anyone better.

'06 does tend to be a little arrogant in his posts - with mistakes - anybody calling the Hopkins defense Dwan's defense needs the meds adjusted. That is 100% Petro through and through

There is absolutely no question the pre-Rabil era and the post-Rabil eras under Petro have been vastly different. Yes the landscape of the game has shifted but did he adapt as well as he could have? Did he choose the right strategies?

I remain steadfast that the biggest mistake was the 100% absolute no holds barred commitment to early recruiting. It has created the direct and indirect issues that in my opinion the team is struggling with:

- Pure misses - kids that excel in a summer league game at 13/14 years old might not be the best players by the time they are 17/18 playing against real competition in high school - conversely you also have the type II error - you miss the kid in the upper class of high school that would kill himself to play for Hopkins because you're off watching the 8th graders play

A couple of points.
- I think Tucker is doing a good job. The question was whether Petro being fired shines a light on Tucker's accomplishments given she has never made a FF at the D1 level. As I said, she is facing way different parameters and requirements. My comment about not being upset if she was retired is that I dont pay attention to what happens with most of the Hopkins sports outside of lax and football.

- I think ER is fine on some level. There is nothing inherently wrong with it if you also tie in being able to cut kids loose if what you saw in 9th grade that resulted in offering a spot with the idea of a kid will be in the same situation by 12th grade. If a kid doesnt improve you should have the conversation with him about finding another school that more suits his skills. There is nothing wrong with that. It happens in other sports all the time. Further, I imagine many kids that ride the pine all 4 years at Hopkins might have contributed at a Detroit Mercy (no offense meant toward to them) or at a D3 school. There is nothing wrong with that. It is not having that conversation that is the problem and results in a roster of 50+ kids which becomes self perpetuating.

[Chitown]

Well, I probably have nothing to add but that has never held me back.

First, I have no criticisms of individual Hopkins players. From watching the games, I genuinely believe the players gave it their "all". They played with intensity and clearly never gave up. Who can really ask for more than that from the players?


The Game is changing constantly. The Field is now artificial, not natural grass. The Stick is "artificial", not as the Creator intended (hickory wood and gut and raw hide) (my younger son is having a wood stick (little head) made for me by a Native American for an important birthday. My son said when he told the maker that I played in the Wood Stick Era, the maker said that is "really cool". Perhaps the last bit of "coolness" available to me ) Sure the Sport is expanding (from tiny to small). The Stick has totally changed how the Game is played. You can't check the ball out of the stick. Stick "handling" is magical. With the shot clock, the Game has sped up and there is a potential return to a 2-way Middie, less substitutions, AND with those changes, a re-emphasis on size, speed and athleticism. When I watched the games this past weekend, I was really impressed by the intensity of the play, and the ground ball fights. The commentators (Quint/Carc) wanted to comment on the shooting, But that wasn't the most impressive thing in these games. Nobody gave up on a "play".


Those Programs who understand these changes are evolving. This is Darwinism at work in Lacrosse. Evolve or go Extinct.

All Colleges start with the same # of scholarships in this non-revenue producing sport. Some have stronger Academic reputations and programs and are more "selective" for students. Fine. JHU doesn't compete against all Universities for the same students. But if the Sport is indeed growing, there are more prospects to choose from. A squad of 40 is about right, 10 recruits a year. Heck, make it 15 a year. Some will drop out, decide not to play, etc. Of course, we can compete in this environment. We can find 40-50 young men/lacrosse players who want to wear that Hopkins uniform. Who wouldn't want to play for Hopkins? And get a Hopkins Degree.


Some people here say the players need to practice their "shooting' more. No. That is not it. Players need to practice GBs, Clears, Rides, defensive postioning, slides, hustle, ball movement, etc. That wins Games. Those were some terrific Games this past weekend. The Players gave it their "all". Nobody gave up. It was wonderful to watch.


For those who say that we are dreaming if we contend that JHU should be in the top 8-4 almost every year. They really don't understand and are clueless. If Duke and Maryland can do it, of course we can.

[Typical Lax Dad]

Well, I probably have nothing to add but that has never held me back.

First, I have no criticisms of individual Hopkins players. From watching the games, I genuinely believe the players gave it their "all". They played with intensity and clearly never gave up. Who can really ask for more than that from the players?


The Game is changing constantly. The Field is now artificial, not natural grass. The Stick is "artificial", not as the Creator intended (hickory wood and gut and raw hide) (my younger son is having a wood stick (little head) made for me by a Native American for an important birthday. My son said when he told the maker that I played in the Wood Stick Era, the maker said that is "really cool". Perhaps the last bit of "coolness" available to me ) Sure the Sport is expanding (from tiny to small). The Stick has totally changed how the Game is played. You can't check the ball out of the stick. Stick "handling" is magical. With the shot clock, the Game has sped up and there is a potential return to a 2-way Middie, less substitutions, AND with those changes, a re-emphasis on size, speed and athleticism. When I watched the games this past weekend, I was really impressed by the intensity of the play, and the ground ball fights. The commentators (Quint/Carc) wanted to comment on the shooting, But that wasn't the most impressive thing in these games. Nobody gave up on a "play".


Those Programs who understand these changes are evolving. This is Darwinism at work in Lacrosse. Evolve or go Extinct.

All Colleges start with the same # of scholarships in this non-revenue producing sport. Some have stronger Academic reputations and programs and are more "selective" for students. Fine. JHU doesn't compete against all Universities for the same students. But if the Sport is indeed growing, there are more prospects to choose from. A squad of 40 is about right, 10 recruits a year. Heck, make it 15 a year. Some will drop out, decide not to play, etc. Of course, we can compete in this environment. We can find 40-50 young men/lacrosse players who want to wear that Hopkins uniform. Who wouldn't want to play for Hopkins? And get a Hopkins Degree.


Some people here say the players need to practice their "shooting' more. No. That is not it. Players need to practice GBs, Clears, Rides, defensive postioning, slides, hustle, ball movement, etc. That wins Games. Those were some terrific Games this past weekend. The Players gave it their "all". Nobody gave up. It was wonderful to watch.


For those who say that we are dreaming if we contend that JHU should be in the top 8-4 almost every year. They really don't understand and are clueless. If Duke and Maryland can do it, of course we can.

Not all schools offer the same # of scholarships.

[jhu06]

Kuhn, marr-who cost them the penn state game, danny jones-too much of a hot head for a sr leader. No I won't miss them because the win/loss results speak for themselves.

If you're not going to miss Kuhn then you're even more obtuse than previously thought. You're in a for a rude awakening next year regarding the LSM position. That's one spot on the field that is likely to get worse, not better. 14 goals, 21 points and 115 groundballs, 4-year starter at a position with unclear depth...you may not "miss" him but the team almost certainly will and please don't come crying to this thread when the next man up isn't as good. Because we all know you will, like clockwork. Your insistence on calling out specific players by name in every post and treating them like they personally owe you something is pretty pathological at this point. I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that Rob Kuhn is a lot more respected and valued in the Hopkins lacrosse community than "jhu06." Show of hands—anyone going to miss this guy if he just suddenly stops posting one day? Outside of maybe SteelHop my guess is nah but even he generally directs his criticism toward the guys getting paid to run the team and not the student-athletes.

This isn't club, d3, d2, auto bid or mid major lacrosse. It's supposed to be the signature program in the sport with kids on scholarship given every amenity and perk a university could provide from weekly national tv exposure to pro caliber strength and training to classroom and career resources and they haven't remotely lived up to it. The program returned 3 close d, an ssdm captain, 2 lsm and finished tied for 58th nationally in defense 55th in gbs appeared to suffer no major injuries and had a negative goal differential for the season. It played 1 decent week of lacrosse in 3.5 months, it finished the decade with 1 pathetic ff. Kuhn and Jones and Foley were supposedly sr leaders on a veteran defense that didn't come out strong to start the year, that was susceptible week in week out to giving up extended runs, and that wasn't able to understand adjustments teams made in game. Is it all on Darby not making saves-then why is he out there and what is larry quinns purpose as a coach? You tell me what I just said there that was factually inaccurate. These are the season stats from the ncaa at the bottom. As for next man up the college game is a 2-3 maybe 4 year thing for players at most, making sure the pipeline is stocked, that guys are developing physically that they're mentally and emotionally prepared to come in and win games is part of winning. Nick Saban always talks about how he prefers college to the pros because a college coach can bring in as many 1st round picks as he can recruit. there should be no shortage of kids trained and ready to go here the way duke, maryland and notre dame have and petro did 15 years ago.

https://stats.ncaa.org/teams/473251

[44WeWantMore]

Well, I probably have nothing to add but that has never held me back.

First, I have no criticisms of individual Hopkins players. From watching the games, I genuinely believe the players gave it their "all". They played with intensity and clearly never gave up. Who can really ask for more than that from the players?


The Game is changing constantly. The Field is now artificial, not natural grass. The Stick is "artificial", not as the Creator intended (hickory wood and gut and raw hide) (my younger son is having a wood stick (little head) made for me by a Native American for an important birthday. My son said when he told the maker that I played in the Wood Stick Era, the maker said that is "really cool". Perhaps the last bit of "coolness" available to me ) Sure the Sport is expanding (from tiny to small). The Stick has totally changed how the Game is played. You can't check the ball out of the stick. Stick "handling" is magical. With the shot clock, the Game has sped up and there is a potential return to a 2-way Middie, less substitutions, AND with those changes, a re-emphasis on size, speed and athleticism. When I watched the games this past weekend, I was really impressed by the intensity of the play, and the ground ball fights. The commentators (Quint/Carc) wanted to comment on the shooting, But that wasn't the most impressive thing in these games. Nobody gave up on a "play".


Those Programs who understand these changes are evolving. This is Darwinism at work in Lacrosse. Evolve or go Extinct.

All Colleges start with the same # of scholarships in this non-revenue producing sport. Some have stronger Academic reputations and programs and are more "selective" for students. Fine. JHU doesn't compete against all Universities for the same students. But if the Sport is indeed growing, there are more prospects to choose from. A squad of 40 is about right, 10 recruits a year. Heck, make it 15 a year. Some will drop out, decide not to play, etc. Of course, we can compete in this environment. We can find 40-50 young men/lacrosse players who want to wear that Hopkins uniform. Who wouldn't want to play for Hopkins? And get a Hopkins Degree.


Some people here say the players need to practice their "shooting' more. No. That is not it. Players need to practice GBs, Clears, Rides, defensive postioning, slides, hustle, ball movement, etc. That wins Games. Those were some terrific Games this past weekend. The Players gave it their "all". Nobody gave up. It was wonderful to watch.


For those who say that we are dreaming if we contend that JHU should be in the top 8-4 almost every year. They really don't understand and are clueless. If Duke and Maryland can do it, of course we can.

Not all schools offer the same # of scholarships.

I am pretty sure the B1G and ACC all do. The State Universities offer an attractive value-proposition (really attractive for in-state applicants). Also very attractive, especially for middle-class families that tend to play lacrosse, is the ability of the Ivy endowments, especially HPY, to define need in such a way that can far exceed the value of a partial athletic scholarships. And of course, the Service Academies are obviously in a different class.

[Typical Lax Dad]

Well, I probably have nothing to add but that has never held me back.

First, I have no criticisms of individual Hopkins players. From watching the games, I genuinely believe the players gave it their "all". They played with intensity and clearly never gave up. Who can really ask for more than that from the players?


The Game is changing constantly. The Field is now artificial, not natural grass. The Stick is "artificial", not as the Creator intended (hickory wood and gut and raw hide) (my younger son is having a wood stick (little head) made for me by a Native American for an important birthday. My son said when he told the maker that I played in the Wood Stick Era, the maker said that is "really cool". Perhaps the last bit of "coolness" available to me ) Sure the Sport is expanding (from tiny to small). The Stick has totally changed how the Game is played. You can't check the ball out of the stick. Stick "handling" is magical. With the shot clock, the Game has sped up and there is a potential return to a 2-way Middie, less substitutions, AND with those changes, a re-emphasis on size, speed and athleticism. When I watched the games this past weekend, I was really impressed by the intensity of the play, and the ground ball fights. The commentators (Quint/Carc) wanted to comment on the shooting, But that wasn't the most impressive thing in these games. Nobody gave up on a "play".


Those Programs who understand these changes are evolving. This is Darwinism at work in Lacrosse. Evolve or go Extinct.

All Colleges start with the same # of scholarships in this non-revenue producing sport. Some have stronger Academic reputations and programs and are more "selective" for students. Fine. JHU doesn't compete against all Universities for the same students. But if the Sport is indeed growing, there are more prospects to choose from. A squad of 40 is about right, 10 recruits a year. Heck, make it 15 a year. Some will drop out, decide not to play, etc. Of course, we can compete in this environment. We can find 40-50 young men/lacrosse players who want to wear that Hopkins uniform. Who wouldn't want to play for Hopkins? And get a Hopkins Degree.


Some people here say the players need to practice their "shooting' more. No. That is not it. Players need to practice GBs, Clears, Rides, defensive postioning, slides, hustle, ball movement, etc. That wins Games. Those were some terrific Games this past weekend. The Players gave it their "all". Nobody gave up. It was wonderful to watch.


For those who say that we are dreaming if we contend that JHU should be in the top 8-4 almost every year. They really don't understand and are clueless. If Duke and Maryland can do it, of course we can.

Not all schools offer the same # of scholarships.

I am pretty sure the B1G and ACC all do. The State Universities offer an attractive value-proposition (really attractive for in-state applicants). Also very attractive, especially for middle-class families that tend to play lacrosse, is the ability of the Ivy endowments, especially HPY, to define need in such a way that can far exceed the value of a partial athletic scholarships. And of course, the Service Academies are obviously in a different class.

I just stated not all offer scholarships.

[viper]

I have no association with Hop or the program. I am just a fan of the sport and admirer of the program.

A few thoughts:

1. If Hopkins moves on from Coach Petro, he will have another job before he makes it to his car in the parking lot. I liken his free agency to that of John Harbaugh's if the Ravens had moved on from him. Their resumes are incredibly impressive and programs around the country would line up to hire them.

I don't really disagree with this view at all. Sometimes it is just better for all parties to move on. There becomes a level of complenancy on all parties. Same thing happened to Andy Reid and the Eagles. It worked out for the Eagles. I doubt any Eagles fan, event he Reid supporters, would even argue that it didn't. It certainly could mean you have your version of Chip Kelly but that just gets you a Doug Pederson. Andy Reid has moved on and become very successful with the Chiefs (and should have played in the SB last year).

2. If ya let him go, who ya gonna hire? Presumably you are hiring someone that can take the program back to a perennial Final Four/National Championship contender. Who can do that for you? And how much time does that person receive to do the job? (Remember-they commit kids so early you need 6 years to get a roster full of your own players.)

This is the fallacy of the fear of change. Maybe it turns bad but doing nothing is not working. 1 FF in 11 years isn't getting it done (Well, Penn guys think it would be okay, but, this is Hopkins). Also, there is no more early recruiting and UVA seemed to have figured it out in 3 years and this was with early recruiting.

3. It is an apples to oranges comparison, but how does Janine still have a job if you are firing Petro? She has accomplished essentially nothing as the head coach there in terms of NCAA Tournament play. Do you do a "Penn State" circa 2010 and fire both men's and women's lacrosse coaches at the same time and revamp your lacrosse programs? It has certainly paid off for them (Tambroni and Doherty).

For the exact reason, you started this paragraph. Tucker is in a completely different position than Petro. The women's program doesn't have a history of national titles. This doesn't lend itself to get the players that dreamed of playing at Homewood and the 44 titles. There wouldn't be top end coaches thinking about taking the job if it was open. She is under much less scrutiny - there isn't even a Hopkins specific thread over on the Women's pages and, well, we are 173 pages and counting for 2019.

Further, the women's program was only really building at the D3 level when it moved to D1. Her goal is to move the program forward and compete in DI and make the tournament. She has also had the issues of moving from D3 to D1 from ECAC to ALC to B1G, so the quality of her opponents have increased over the years.

I won't argue with the view her accomplishments are less than Petros. I also won't argue that if Petro's fired that it shine's light on her situation. But, I also think she is working with a totally different set of parameters. That isn't to say if she was fired I'd be upset but I wouldn't lose sleep over it.

4. How are you determining that the Hopkins program is underachieving? Are you comparing it to other schools? If so, what schools are you using as the benchmark---what schools in D1 lacrosse have the similar academic profile, exist in a hotbed, etc.? And, once you can say what schools are equivalent, how have their programs faired over the past 9-10 years (the time period you have been unhappy with Petro).

It is a comparison to other top lacrosse schools. Every school has numerous pros and cons associated with it what binds those teams together is regularly competing for national titles or has historically competed for national titles. You can list them out: UMd, UNC, UVA, SU, Duke, Denver and I would qualify the last team as simply as IVY.

I mean by saying Ivy is that the conference seams to have runs of different dominate teams so IVY would be an amalgamation of Princeton, Cornell, Brown and Yale.

As I said, if Hopkins had a similar run to Denver's last 10 years, there wouldn't be the issue there is right now.

5. Lastly, are you truly prepared to move on from a man that: is an alum, deeply cares about his players, has won two national championships, coached in four national championship games, and coached in seven final fours, and has an overall record of 205-89?

The 2 championships and 4 title games were over a decade ago. 6 of his 7 final four appearance ago were over a decade ago. His record from 2001 to 2008 was 96 and 25 (.793 win percentage). From 2009 to 2019 he is 109 and 64 (.630 win percentage). The 2019 senior class has an overall win percentage of .571. I don't even have to go into the record books to know that is the worst record ever over a 4 year period at Hopkins.

So, yes. It is time to move on.

The schools you are comparing Hopkins to are NOT Hopkins. By every measurable available, they are BETTER. They are BCS. They have football. They have big money. The list goes on. Hopkins is NOT UVA, Maryland, UNC, etc. They were equivalents from a lacrosse perspective many years ago, but with the growth of the sport came the growth of BCS schools in and supporting the sport. Which is EXACTLY why Hopkins joining the Big Ten was a problem. They do not have the resources their Big Ten counterparts do. They would be better off in the Patriot or Colonial; where you can see comparable schools like Loyola and Towson competing and succeeding.

The basis of your unrest is that Hopkins isn't performing on the level of UVA, MD, UNC, etc. You know why they are not performing like them? Because THEY are not THEM! You aren't being fair to your coach, players, and school.

I love the way every school in America is better than Hopkins in some way or another and that's why they can't recruit anybody with talent anymore and will from now on just be a memory on the lacrosse landscape.

Every school has its advantages and disadvantages, including Hopkins. Every recruit has an idea of what is important to them in a school/program. For some Hop does not fit the bill, for others it does. Based on ER it seems that most 13 year olds really want to go to Hopkins, regarding 17 year olds I would say the jury is out because they haven't needed any in quite some time.

I would argue at this point there is plenty of talent to go around and recruiting is no longer about getting the best individuals but by getting the right individuals who can be coalesced into a team by the right coaches. Always good to get 2 or 3 impact players, but building the supporting cast is just as important. I have not seen a team quite as dominant as PSU in a while I don't expect as we move into the future (not including next year at PSU) that it will be the exception rather than the rule where a team has such elite players at almost every position on the field.

I for one do think Hopkins can challenge for National Championships again in the future. I am not sure if it will be with the current coaches or new ones, but I don't think the tradition is quite dead yet.

[WOMBAT, Mod Emeritus]