New England West 2025

[pcowlax]

Friday blast from the past........

https://www.insidelacrosse.com/article/ ... ings/29477

Very interesting. Interesting to see that, while there are some solid players on there, not many really turned into out and out stars (Guterding and Cloutier huge exceptions).

Indeed. Probably par for the course though, right? For every Peter Buonanno in a PG class there are going to be 4-5 JAGs at the next level.

That picture also reminds me of the dark times from about 2008-2014 when the bagginess of lacrosse uniforms was just absolutely terrible. Everyone looked like they were wearing their older brother's jersey and shorts.

Ha! Great call. Hard to look very athletic when you are sporting the Seinfeld blousy pirate sleeve look.

[PhishFall97]

The mid to late 2000s were wild times in terms of the size of lacrosse uniforms.. Most notably the shorts.

[Laxxal22]

Two notes on incoming PGs.

Jack Curran - Lsm/Def, Salisbury - flipped from Richmond to Brown.
Liam Appleton - Mid, Deerfield - committed to Brown. Wouldn't be shocked to see football come back into the picture if he has a big fall on the gridiron.

[NEWestFan]

Per Inside Lacrosse Class of 2026 player rankings.
5 stars 4 stars 3stars Total stars

AOF 0 0 1 3
Brunswick 2 3 5 37
Choate 0 2 0 8
Deerfield 1 3 0 17
Loomis 1 3 3 26
Salisbury 0 2 5 23
Taft 0 3 2 18
TP 0 0 1 3

L'ville 1 5 4 37

[justanotherperson]

Very cool and interesting analysis. It kind of translates into how I expect the season to play out as well. I dont usually put much weight into the star system though. I am surprised that D'field is low as I do expect them to do better and S'Bury has a lot of returning people so I also expect them to compete but Wick and Loomis should still likely reign supreme

[justanotherperson]

Cross posted in another forum, there was the discussion about where do prep school kids end up and the caliber of school so I decided to dig deeper. For 2024's, there were 197 "listed" varsity NEW 1 players that I have on record and this is the distribution of schools they attended. This is not an indictment on what schools are better than others but you can see a pattern of where prep school players may end up. I didnt do ISL but I suspect it will be the same (cant compete with laxxal22's excellent work) and the 2024 class went to some great schools. I dont know how accurate my data is but here goes:

197 listed varsity players
-79 (40.1%) uncommitted (I did not dig deep into these to figure out if the eschewed lacrosse for a "top" academic school. Ssome committed for other sports as well)
-69 (35.0%) D1 - (48 (69.6%) went to IVy / Patriot / ACC / B10)
-7 (3.6%) D2
-42 (21.3%) D3 - (16 (38.1%) went to NESCAC, 10 (23.8%) - LIberty, 1-MIT)

Air Force
Amherst (2)
Army
Bates
Bentley
Boston University (2)
Bowdoin
Brown (3)
Bryant
Catholic
Clark
Clarkson
Cleveland State
Colby
Colgate (4)
Colorado College
Connecticut College
Cornell (2)
Dartmouth (3)
Denison
Denver
Drexel
Fairfield
Georgetown (4)
Gettysburg (3)
Harvard (2)
High Point
Hofstra
Holy Cross (3)
Iona (2)
Jacksonville
Johns Hopkins (2)
Kenyon
Lafayette
Loyola
Lynchburg
Marist
Michigan (2)
Middlebury
MIT
Navy (2)
North Carolina (2)
Notre Dame
Oberlin
Ohio State
Ohio Wesleyan
Penn (2)
Princeton (2)
Providence
Quinnipiac
Richmond
RIT
Robert Morris
Rutgers (2)
Saint Lawrence (4)
Salisbury
Skidmore (2)
Syracuse (2)
Tampa (2)
Towson
Trinity (3)
Tufts (3)
U of Indianapolis
U of Massachusetts (3)
Union (2)
Ursinus
Vermont (2)
Virginia (3)
Wentworth
Wesleyan
Western New England
Wilkes
Williams (2)
Yale (2)

Finally, this may be controversial but I did notice for the NEW1 schools, depending on how they are academically ranked, the distribution of the colleges slightly changed (with Kent and Wick as outliers) from top to bottom. This is not to validate prep school rankings nor is it an indictment on which prep school is better because out of 4546 prep schools they are all pretty darn good; just an observation. Niche academic rankings as follows:

#9 Choate
#22 Hotchkiss
#33 Deerfield
#35 Loomis
#51 Taft
#94 NMH
#115 Kent
#373 Avon Old Farms
#380 Salisbury
#399 Westminster
#407 Berkshire
#633 Trinity Pawling
NR Brunswick

[justanotherperson]

Thanks to Sportin LIfe and others for some of the intel. Hope everyone had a great summer and for those with kids starting, hope its a fantastic year.

"TRANSFER PORTAL" 2024 / 2025

The accuracy of this list is essentially crowdsourced information, so its intent is not to pass false information nor offend anyone. If anyone has any corrections or new additions, please feel free to send them in. Some of the new 2027's may have been at the school last year. Bold are the new additions:

AVON OLD FARMS:
-PG: Blaise Coley, Attack, Haddonfield (NJ) (Christopher Newport)
-2026 -> 2027: Brody Root, Defense, Guilford (CT)
-2027 -> 2028: Charlie Rice, Attack, PolyPrep (NY)

BERKSHIRE:
-2027 -> 2028: Walker Harvey, LSM, Cardigan Mountain School

CHOATE:
-PG: George Hawley, Defense, Fairfield Prep (Dartmouth) - I think its Choate as I saw it somewhere but I cant confirm this
-PG: Mitch Kavey, A/M, Tabor (MA) (Loyola)
-PG: Jacob Thibodeau, Attack, MIddlesex School (uncommitted --> Colby)
-2025 -> 2026: Jack DiFranco, Defense, De La Salle (NY)
-2025 -> 2026: Luke Hegarty, Midfield, Community School of Naples (FL)
-2027: Jaxon Lin, Defense, Wilton (CT)
-2027: Gus Markley, Midfield, Telluride (CO)
-2027-->2028: Mac Privateer, Goalie, Frontier (NY)

DEERFIELD:
-PG: Liam Appleton, Midfield, Cohasset (MA) (uncommitted - football?)
-PG: Matt Johnson, Attack, Andover High School (MA) (Gtown)
-PG: Brayden Leahy, Attack, Trinity Pawling (NY) (Virginia)
-PG: Atticus Oliven, Defense, St Ignatius College Prep (CA) (Michigan)
-2025 -> 2026: Henry Oliver, Defense, Mary Institute and Saint Louis Country Day School (MO) (BU)
-2026: Cooper Lawson, Goalie, Lakefield School (Ontario)
-2026: Remi Zeitlan, SSDM, Poly Prep (NY)
-2026 -> 2027: Justin Scalzo, FOGO, Ridgewood (NJ)

HOTCHKISS:
-2026-->2027: Bryce Lopes, Midfield, LaSalle Academy (RI)
-2026: Leonardo Barbagallo, FOGO, Salisbury (CT)

LOOMIS:
-PG: Hayden Cody, FO, Roxbury Latin (Bucknell)
-PG: Jack Connolly, Middie, Chaminade (NY) (uncommitted)
-PG: David Disque, Midfield, Syosset (Hopkins)
-PG: Cole Goodwillie, Middie, Latin School of Chicago (IL) (Harvard)
-PG: Rowyn Nurry, Attack, Salesianum (Cornell)
-PG: Gray Tamasco, D, New Canaan (CT) (Richmond)
-2026 -> 2027: Owen Heske, Middie, St. Ignatius College Prep (CA)
-2026-->2027: Noah Rodgers, Midfield, Montclair Kimberly Academy (NJ)
-2027 -> 2028: Ika Oja, Attack, Corner Canyon HS (UT)
-2027 -> 2028: Jake Colclasure, Goalie, De La Salle HS (CA)

NORTHFIELD MOUNT HERMON:
-PG: Quaadir Durden, FOGO, Pennington School (NJ) (uncommitted)
-PG: Ryder Sunday, Defense, Massena High (NY) (uncommitted)
-PG: Will Swezey, D/LSM, Gonzaga (DC) (uncommitted -> Skidmore)
-2026: Mason Bussman, Attack, East Lyme (CT)

SALISBURY:
-PG: Jack Curran, Defense, Needham, MA (Richmond --> Brown)
-PG: Grant Ramsey, Defense, Deerfield Academy (Denver)
-PG: FInn Rodgers, Attack, Steamboat Springs (CO) (Delaware)
-2025-->2026: Jackson Allen, LSM, IMG (FL)
-2026: James Whitehorse, Attack, Culver (IN)
-2027: Giacomo Clark, Defense, Northwest Catholic (CT)
-2027: Conor Reynold, Goalie, Fayetteville-Manilus (NY)

TAFT:
-PG: Charlie Lowe, Attack, Chatam (NJ) (Bates)
-PG: John Fisher, Goalie, Battlefield HS (VA) (Richmond)
-PG: Asher Ziv, Midfield, Pingry (Yale)
-2026: Aidan McElrone, Attack, Winchendon (MA)
-2027: Jack Mather, Defense, Olympus High School (UT)
-2027: Teddy Oh: Goalie, Sacred Heart Prep (CA)

WESTMINSTER:
-PG: Emilio Tanzi, Midfield, Weston (MA) (Saint Anselm)

[pcowlax]

Thanks to Sportin LIfe and others for some of the intel. Hope everyone had a great summer and for those with kids starting, hope its a fantastic year.

"TRANSFER PORTAL" 2024 / 2025

The accuracy of this list is essentially crowdsourced information, so its intent is not to pass false information nor offend anyone. If anyone has any corrections or new additions, please feel free to send them in. Some of the new 2027's may have been at the school last year. Bold are the new additions:

AVON OLD FARMS:
-PG: Blaise Coley, Attack, Haddonfield (NJ) (Christopher Newport)
-2026 -> 2027: Brody Root, Defense, Guilford (CT)
-2027 -> 2028: Charlie Rice, Attack, PolyPrep (NY)

BERKSHIRE:
-2027 -> 2028: Walker Harvey, LSM, Cardigan Mountain School

CHOATE:
-PG: George Hawley, Defense, Fairfield Prep (Dartmouth) - I think its Choate as I saw it somewhere but I cant confirm this
-PG: Mitch Kavey, A/M, Tabor (MA) (Loyola)
-PG: Jacob Thibodeau, Attack, MIddlesex School (uncommitted --> Colby)
-2025 -> 2026: Jack DiFranco, Defense, De La Salle (NY)
-2025 -> 2026: Luke Hegarty, Midfield, Community School of Naples (FL)
-2027: Jaxon Lin, Defense, Wilton (CT)
-2027: Gus Markley, Midfield, Telluride (CO)
-2027-->2028: Mac Privateer, Goalie, Frontier (NY)

DEERFIELD:
-PG: Liam Appleton, Midfield, Cohasset (MA) (uncommitted - football?)
-PG: Matt Johnson, Attack, Andover High School (MA) (Gtown)
-PG: Brayden Leahy, Attack, Trinity Pawling (NY) (Virginia)
-PG: Atticus Oliven, Defense, St Ignatius College Prep (CA) (Michigan)
-2025 -> 2026: Henry Oliver, Defense, Mary Institute and Saint Louis Country Day School (MO) (BU)
-2026: Cooper Lawson, Goalie, Lakefield School (Ontario)
-2026: Remi Zeitlan, SSDM, Poly Prep (NY)
-2026 -> 2027: Justin Scalzo, FOGO, Ridgewood (NJ)

HOTCHKISS:
-2026-->2027: Bryce Lopes, Midfield, LaSalle Academy (RI)
-2026: Leonardo Barbagallo, FOGO, Salisbury (CT)

LOOMIS:
-PG: Hayden Cody, FO, Roxbury Latin (Bucknell)
-PG: Jack Connolly, Middie, Chaminade (NY) (uncommitted)
-PG: David Disque, Midfield, Syosset (Hopkins)
-PG: Cole Goodwillie, Middie, Latin School of Chicago (IL) (Harvard)
-PG: Rowyn Nurry, Attack, Salesianum (Cornell)
-PG: Gray Tamasco, D, New Canaan (CT) (Richmond)
-2026 -> 2027: Owen Heske, Middie, St. Ignatius College Prep (CA)
-2026-->2027: Noah Rodgers, Midfield, Montclair Kimberly Academy (NJ)
-2027 -> 2028: Ika Oja, Attack, Corner Canyon HS (UT)
-2027 -> 2028: Jake Colclasure, Goalie, De La Salle HS (CA)

NORTHFIELD MOUNT HERMON:
-PG: Quaadir Durden, FOGO, Pennington School (NJ) (uncommitted)
-PG: Ryder Sunday, Defense, Massena High (NY) (uncommitted)
-PG: Will Swezey, D/LSM, Gonzaga (DC) (uncommitted -> Skidmore)
-2026: Mason Bussman, Attack, East Lyme (CT)

SALISBURY:
-PG: Jack Curran, Defense, Needham, MA (Richmond --> Brown)
-PG: Grant Ramsey, Defense, Deerfield Academy (Denver)
-PG: FInn Rodgers, Attack, Steamboat Springs (CO) (Delaware)
-2025-->2026: Jackson Allen, LSM, IMG (FL)
-2026: James Whitehorse, Attack, Culver (IN)
-2027: Giacomo Clark, Defense, Northwest Catholic (CT)
-2027: Conor Reynold, Goalie, Fayetteville-Manilus (NY)

TAFT:
-PG: Charlie Lowe, Attack, Chatam (NJ) (Bates)
-PG: John Fisher, Goalie, Battlefield HS (VA) (Richmond)
-PG: Asher Ziv, Midfield, Pingry (Yale)
-2026: Aidan McElrone, Attack, Winchendon (MA)
-2027: Jack Mather, Defense, Olympus High School (UT)
-2027: Teddy Oh: Goalie, Sacred Heart Prep (CA)

WESTMINSTER:
-PG: Emilio Tanzi, Midfield, Weston (MA) (Saint Anselm)

Thank you for this, great info and very illuminating. Loomis reeeeeeaaaalllly leaning into this year, they will be excellent and had better be given this manipulation of the roster. Westy was never a top of the league team but for many years were very solid and gave everyone a tough game (and of course would have crushed 90% of teams across the country). Now however, with the recruiting really just moving to absurd levels, they have been left completely behind. You don’t need to know anything about current players at any of the schools, just look at the above and you know exactly how they will do this year and going forward. They are smaller than most of the other schools (dropped football in the last few years) and I guess they just can’t designate a significant portion of each class to lax recruits. The PG’ing at one West-1 school after graduating from another continues apace and continues, in most cases, to be a very odd look.

[justanotherperson]

Pcowlax, I think that is a great point: really no need to make hard predictions; just look at the incoming transfer talent. I will so it is likely a coarse representation of success as Deerfield was a paper tiger last year with all the talent they brought in last year. And 'Wick doesnt do PG's; they just reclass so their list will always be misleading

But I think you touch on a larger point with haves and have nots already occurring with the shift from Public to Prep, that even within the prep community, there is a microdissection of haves and have nots with a few standout Prep Schools and schools like Westy possibly falling behind. One could extrapolate to college lax that really only 5-8 teams probably have a chance to winning it all, which I think will be made worse by expanding the scholarship pool. And with college football heading the way it is, there will be only a few teams in the 3 power conferences that have a chance to win it all

The one disclaimer I have for High School is that there are most assuredly more players that have transferred in / PG'ing and I just dont know, until rosters are released. I expect AOF and TP and choate to have many more than what is listed here.

[Sportin' Life]

Lots of good observations by pcowlax and justanotherperson. One factor to bear in mind about the new additions to these teams is that we're talking about teenage boys. In many cases they are impressive on paper or film but the real challenges for them are to integrate themselves into teams on which they may not be as dominant as they were on previous squads, to take on new, and sometimes lesser, roles and to adjust to their new coaches' styles and their school's academic and social environments. Regardless of talent level, not every incoming player is mature enough to be successful in making this transition. It's especially hard for PGs who only have a few months to adjust. Bringing in a cohort of PGs isn't a guarantee of success as we have seen with DA, Salisbury, Taft and others in seasons past but it can make a significant difference if the kids buy into the culture and system and the system is designed to quickly mesh their talents.

In terms of NEW1 haves and have nots, I'm not too worried about the perceived have nots. As justanotherperson said, there are incoming kids who aren't on this list who will be difference makers for their schools whether in the spring of '25 or beyond. '24 was Joe Rodrigues' first year at Westy and he deserves time to build. I'm sure he has cranked up the focus on recruiting and is all in on making his alma mater's lax program competitive again in the Founders League. New coaches breath life into their programs as we've seen over the last three years with Bill Ball at LC. I expect JR Mastro will do the same at Hotchkiss as evidenced by his team's play by the end vs. the beginning of last spring and some of the talent he is attracting such as FOGO Leo Barbagallo, a recent Brown commit. The opportunity is there for Kyle Jackson to do the same at AOF although I have heard rumblings that his NLL commitments took him away from campus with regularity last spring and diluted his impact as a coach. I expect Brunswick, DA and Salisbury will continue to attract top talent. It'll be interesting to see if Max Rosner can do so at the Nic Bell level at Taft. LC has turned the corner and is a force to be reckoned with. CRH is a program on the rise, in part thanks to PGs but also due to other players as well, as evidenced over the last two seasons. The good news for all NEW1 schools is that there are more lax players than ever from across the country who are seeking opportunities to get a great education and play against top talent. All ships rise with the tide, which is a good thing for student-athletes and NEW1 schools.

[pcowlax]

Completely agree that you never know how incoming players will fare at the extremely high level of West-1 and how they adapt to being away from home for the first time if this is their first year boarding. Rather than the specific players, I see schools that are bringing a bunch of PGs and reclasses as really putting an emphasis not just on running a strong program with good development of players but also fully institutionally dedicated to winning. As a result, they usually are the ones that do, though of course the talent across the league is such that there are no gimmies (OK, 2 gimmies) and upsets definitely happen. I certainly hope the Martlets and Bearcats can turn it around. I'm not too worried about Taft or AOF, they will be there. It is always good when Choate is competitive, they have definitely improved the past few years. Thanks again for all of the info.

[justanotherperson]

Good stuff by SL and PCL.

You have, perhaps, given me a new perspective that it isnt necessarily haves and have nots, but instead, its everyone getting better, the proverbial rising tide and that it is more of an arms race with everyone having shiny new weaopns. I do believe the new Westy and AOF coaches are building a new culture and even NMH under the former Bowdoin assistant has been more aggressive. I concur that Bill Ball has set the early gold standard on how to get better quickly and build a foundation, though I believe that Choate was early out of the gate with the current recruiting methods but they have not had as much "success" as of late.

So its all teams getting better but they are all still catching up to L'Ville which brings up an interesting point and your point about integrating PG's and teenage kids. With Lville and 'Wick being the dominant programs, ones who dont realy on PG's and instead develop reclasses, is that the better alt-model for building a powerhouse. I know if I had a choice to build a program, I would much rather have the culture of developing reclasses for 1-3 years rather than rely and integrate PG's. Though I should say Dabo at Clemson is having an issue with the development model

[3rdPersonPlural]

Good stuff by SL and PCL.

You have, perhaps, given me a new perspective that it isnt necessarily haves and have nots, but instead, its everyone getting better, the proverbial rising tide and that it is more of an arms race with everyone having shiny new weaopns. I do believe the new Westy and AOF coaches are building a new culture and even NMH under the former Bowdoin assistant has been more aggressive. I concur that Bill Ball has set the early gold standard on how to get better quickly and build a foundation, though I believe that Choate was early out of the gate with the current recruiting methods but they have not had as much "success" as of late.

So its all teams getting better but they are all still catching up to L'Ville which brings up an interesting point and your point about integrating PG's and teenage kids. With Lville and 'Wick being the dominant programs, ones who dont realy on PG's and instead develop reclasses, is that the better alt-model for building a powerhouse. I know if I had a choice to build a program, I would much rather have the culture of developing reclasses for 1-3 years rather than rely and integrate PG's. Though I should say Dabo at Clemson is having an issue with the development model

For years I had been bemoaning the AOF results because they packed in seriously talented players and then played like a summer tournament All-Star team. I've also admired Chip's DA teams, which always seem to integrate a small handful of PGs into a team-oriented scheme.

But this leads us to the reason that so many savvy college coaches ask some prospects to PG for a year. A guy who is the best player in his league gets used to doing it all himself, which is a handicap when you get to a top D1 Program, where everyone else is at least as good. A year with a NEWest1 team begins to teach that kid that team play beats hero ball every time, and he doesn't soak up a season of NCAA eligibility learning that invaluable lesson.