New Programs

[DQKing]

What is the status of Multnomah and UHSP for this spring? Are they playing?
Westcliff looks to have their schedule and roster up so that's a positive for them.
Life starts next year correct?
Mount Mercy and St. Thomas added women's recently -- any chance of men's being close behind?
Who are other potential adds going forward?

[laxtea69]

What is the status of Multnomah and UHSP for this spring? Are they playing?
Westcliff looks to have their schedule and roster up so that's a positive for them.
Life starts next year correct?
Mount Mercy and St. Thomas added women's recently -- any chance of men's being close behind?
Who are other potential adds going forward?

Not sure if I would count Multnomah as "new", they've been around for a few years but have yet to figure out how to field a full team. However, I believe they might have it this year and are playing a club team route.

UHSP are planning to start up next year. They struggled finding a good head coach, so they just went with Diaz. Their women's team is scheduled to play this upcoming spring though.

I'm with you, I'm excited to see Westcliff play this year! I think they'll have a horrendous schedule playing basically all away games in time zones not even close to their own, but that might be what we have to do to get NAIA lacrosse started in the west coast.

So potential adds to look for.... Baker University in Kansas. If they add, and hire a relatively good coach, look for them to be dirty. There are some deep rumors that they will add since they recently renovated their field, and they have lacrosse lines on them.
With that in mind, look for other Heart schools to add now that they are in their own conference.

[DQKing]

Multnomah has a small schedule up and have Westcliff twice along with Midland -- other games are MCLA opponents. Roster listing is less than 10 at this point so unless things change they won't be playing this year.

Baker: Would seem like a good add for the HoA. Is the field you mention in question Liston Stadium? If so, doesn't that host high school and community games/sports as well? Could it simply have been lined that way at the outset to incorporate as any sports as possible? Not trying to be negative just asking if it is truly a sign or just wishful thinking. Any other thoughts on who else from HoA may add?

[laxtea69]

Multnomah has a small schedule up and have Westcliff twice along with Midland -- other games are MCLA opponents. Roster listing is less than 10 at this point so unless things change they won't be playing this year.

Baker: Would seem like a good add for the HoA. Is the field you mention in question Liston Stadium? If so, doesn't that host high school and community games/sports as well? Could it simply have been lined that way at the outset to incorporate as any sports as possible? Not trying to be negative just asking if it is truly a sign or just wishful thinking. Any other thoughts on who else from HoA may add?

That is a good point about Baker. I think however, they would only pay for lines if they planned on using them, maybe in a selfish kind of way. However, I could also see them just doing it for high school play, since it's growing there in Kansas. Grow the game and host some tournaments, and make some money on the side.

I think some other Heart teams that could add would be Culver-Stockton and Mount Mercy, since they have a women's team. Like mentioned early, Mount Mercy just added, so they could definitely be looking to add soon. Culver-Stockton has had a women's team for a while and haven't added men's, so that seems to be drifting farther away as a possibility.

One I'd like to see add would be Grand View. Grand View would be a really good lacrosse school if they added! Being in Des Moines could be attractive to some guys who desire something to do in their off time. Let's be honest, if Luke Christiansen (WPU) can recruit 40+ guys to lousy little town in the middle of Iowa, think about what he would do in Des Moines. I also think they could be similar to an Indiana Tech, which is also in a bigger city if they recruit right.

Some of the better teams in the NAIA lacrosse world, are in the bigger cities/towns. With some exceptions being, Reinhardt and UC. Other than that, most schools are either in a bigger area, or very close to one, within 30ish minutes. Just a thought.

[Yeti_33]

Took a quick look at Life's instagram. Looks like they hit the transfer portal hard and brought in some D1 and D2 guys. Curious to see if they rise to the Top 10 fairly quickly...

[DQKing]

The Life transfers are interesting -- a quick 20 minutes of work on the internets and it's even more interesting.

Mercer transfer looks legit and played a lot his last year there which was when he was junior. Is either a graduate or senior this year and can't find that he played last year.
Quinnipiac transfer looks solid as well.
Cleveland State transfer goalie will be a senior and played in two games in three years with 1 save and 1 goal allowed.
Jacksonville commit (?) transfer? They labeled as being from Jacksonville but I don't show he ever played there. Found something that he went to Tampa also but again nothing I can find that showed he ever played. Was apparently a 2022 and then reclassed to 2023? Played at a couple highly rated boarding schools. No telling what this holds.
Have a D3 transfer who played 4 years already and should be 24 now at this point.
Multiple D2/NAIA transfers - some look promising and jury out on other as just not enough info to know.

Will be interesting to see how they do their first year and if it is sustainable and then how does that affect Reinhardt since they are so close. What will also be interesting will be to see how these "D1" guys perform. You have to have skills to get there but I contend there are a lot of top tier kids at D2/D3/MCLA/NAIA that get overlooked for whatever reason. It's a team game also so two stars do not automatically cement a team as top tier.

End of the day let's watch and see what happens - Should prove to be interesting at the very least!

[Yeti_33]

Agreed. Not suggesting they'll be national championship contenders right out of the gate because of some transfers. It's just refreshing to see a new NAIA program that looks like it's able to bring in decent talent and be competitive. Too often we see obscure new NAIA programs start up only to field no more than 15 players and end up folding a year or two later.