The 2017 Lacrosse thread

[CrabDaddy]

This may turn out to be a short thread, but here goes, LOL...

NCAA has started, high schools, youth programs are getting geared up. Another lacrosse season is upon us! If you have any interest in the game, please post your thoughts, observations, or opinions. I'd be interested to hear from any former players, current players (at any level youth-Masters), coaches, parents, refs, or fans. Whatever you want to talk about - rankings, matchups, strategy, players...

 

No lax program where I grew up. My son's participation got me interested in the game, and I started coaching local youth teams. I like to follow the NCAA and local (Maryland) HS teams. I follow Lacrosse Film Room, Joe Keegan, Casey Powell, 10 Man Ride on socials.

 

I know you're out there... hey even Steve Smith, Sr tweeted congratulations to the U of Utah club lacrosse team! ... let's hear from you!

[jmar87]

There are probably few of us here. I played in high school in central Texas 15 years ago. The sport has definitely grown around here, but lots of schools still do not have a team.

[The Chicken Connoisseur]

I don't play but my little brother plays in HS here in CA. Our older cousin played for Maryland, and then coached a big school out here

[warfelg]

I need to get back into coaching. I played, was a D1 recruit until I got hurt, got into coaching, took a 0 win team to the playoffs, coached a couple D3 players. I really miss it.

[CrabDaddy]

I need to get back into coaching. I played, was a D1 recruit until I got hurt, got into coaching, took a 0 win team to the playoffs, coached a couple D3 players. I really miss it.

I've really enjoyed coaching, as well. Always thinking about new drills, new ways to get my players improving.

What HS did you play for?

[CrabDaddy]

There are probably few of us here. I played in high school in central Texas 15 years ago. The sport has definitely grown around here, but lots of schools still do not have a team.

Definitely taking off in Dallas area. I've seen several club teams (Iron Horse, I think was one) at tournaments here in MD.

[CrabDaddy]

I don't play but my little brother plays in HS here in CA. Our older cousin played for Maryland, and then coached a big school out here

Lacrosse is definitely trying to expand into CA. Pacific Coast Shootout has been held in Costa Mesa for the last 3 years, featuring 2 top NCAA teams. MD-ND was last year's game, and probably the best defensive game you'll ever see. (Entire game is on YouTube). Cornell vs UVA this year.

[warfelg]

I need to get back into coaching. I played, was a D1 recruit until I got hurt, got into coaching, took a 0 win team to the playoffs, coached a couple D3 players. I really miss it.

I've really enjoyed coaching, as well. Always thinking about new drills, new ways to get my players improving.

What HS did you play for?

 

Hempfield in PA. I was one of those D1 recruits that played later, was told if I wanted to, walking on would be possible.

[CrabDaddy]

I'm not a fan of starting the NCAA season in early February, but there have been some excellent games, so far - Hopkins over Loyola in OT, Syracuse coming back from 5 goals down to beat Albany.

More big matchups this weekend - JHU vs UNC, MD vs Yale.

Army vs Syracuse and Penn St vs Villanova are interesting, as well.

[warfelg]

I'll be going to PSU-Fairfield this year. My ala mater vs my dads.

[Kbrown2]

I'm not a fan of starting the NCAA season in early February, but there have been some excellent games, so far - Hopkins over Loyola in OT, Syracuse coming back from 5 goals down to beat Albany.

More big matchups this weekend - JHU vs UNC, MD vs Yale.

Army vs Syracuse and Penn St vs Villanova are interesting, as well.

 

For those of us who never get to watch a game once our seasons start (or at least live, anyway), it is very much appreciated. Why might I ask are you not a fan? J Tinney doesn't care what month of the year it is, he just wants to play and rip your face off in the process.

 

There are probably few of us here. I played in high school in central Texas 15 years ago. The sport has definitely grown around here, but lots of schools still do not have a team.

 

A few big college coaches seem convinced Texas is going to be the go to spot for recruits.

[CrabDaddy]

I'm not a fan of starting the NCAA season in early February, but there have been some excellent games, so far - Hopkins over Loyola in OT, Syracuse coming back from 5 goals down to beat Albany.

More big matchups this weekend - JHU vs UNC, MD vs Yale.

Army vs Syracuse and Penn St vs Villanova are interesting, as well.

 

For those of us who never get to watch a game once our seasons start (or at least live, anyway), it is very much appreciated. Why might I ask are you not a fan? J Tinney doesn't care what month of the year it is, he just wants to play and rip your face off in the process.

 

There are probably few of us here. I played in high school in central Texas 15 years ago. The sport has definitely grown around here, but lots of schools still do not have a team.

 

A few big college coaches seem convinced Texas is going to be the go to spot for recruits.

Not sure I get the context of your first sentence.

The season used to start in early March, and it's been steadily creeping forward on the calendar in recent years. The NCAA sets start dates for many (most?) sports, but lacrosse isn't one of them. I don't like it because of the weather 1. February snow storms in NE and Mid-Atlantic will wreck havoc with the schedules, 2. It's not fan-friendly - tough to get people in the stands when it's 34 degrees and raining. There goes a big part of home field advantage. And, 3. There's a cheap feel to the games played at indoor practice fields (like ND and Mich) with a couple fans standing along the wall. Let's face it, we've been VERY lucky this year! There haven't been many games where you see 10' of snow piled up in the background, lol.

Yeah, Tinney is lighting it up! Much more to his game than the fake flips that make the highlights! JHU looks like a serious contender this year.

 

 

[Kbrown2]

I'm not a fan of starting the NCAA season in early February, but there have been some excellent games, so far - Hopkins over Loyola in OT, Syracuse coming back from 5 goals down to beat Albany.

More big matchups this weekend - JHU vs UNC, MD vs Yale.

Army vs Syracuse and Penn St vs Villanova are interesting, as well.

 

For those of us who never get to watch a game once our seasons start (or at least live, anyway), it is very much appreciated. Why might I ask are you not a fan? J Tinney doesn't care what month of the year it is, he just wants to play and rip your face off in the process.

 

There are probably few of us here. I played in high school in central Texas 15 years ago. The sport has definitely grown around here, but lots of schools still do not have a team.

 

A few big college coaches seem convinced Texas is going to be the go to spot for recruits.

Not sure I get the context of your first sentence.

The season used to start in early March, and it's been steadily creeping forward on the calendar in recent years. The NCAA sets start dates for many (most?) sports, but lacrosse isn't one of them. I don't like it because of the weather 1. February snow storms in NE and Mid-Atlantic will wreck havoc with the schedules, 2. It's not fan-friendly - tough to get people in the stands when it's 34 degrees and raining. There goes a big part of home field advantage. And, 3. There's a cheap feel to the games played at indoor practice fields (like ND and Mich) with a couple fans standing along the wall. Let's face it, we've been VERY lucky this year! There haven't been many games where you see 10' of snow piled up in the background, lol.

Yeah, Tinney is lighting it up! Much more to his game than the fake flips that make the highlights! JHU looks like a serious contender this year.

 

I just meant it to say as a HS coach who travels pretty heavily starting in March, the Feb games give me a chance to A.) watch some live on TV, which is preferable because I almost always inevitably hear the outcome before I get the chance to catch it on a replay, B.) can fly out eat or elsewhere to catch a game or two if I really want to, which would otherwise be prohibited later in the season. I'm pretty lacrosse landlocked so I don't take those opportunities for granted. And even though this year is the exception, I have gladly sat outside at Arlotta for their early games whilst freezing my dick off.

 

To some extent I agree with what you said about venues being somewhat cheap early on for some geographic locations. Having said that, I'm only about 45 mins away from South Bend, and when they play in Loftus (ND's indoor facility), I really enjoy it. Arlotta (their outdoor venue) is great, but there's something to be said about being field level and hearing all of the talk that goes on, it gets my Irish up, so to speak. ND will be interesting to watch this year.

 

Tinney has the highest compete level in D1 right now, IMO. There is literally heat radiating off of him when he plays, whether it be at practice or games. Ethan Walker is certainly a huge addition at Denver (you might be noticing a trend here), and his release on shots is only going to become more of a threat as BT and MB find more and more ways to set him up. Assuming your'e a MD fan??? I really hope Neufeldt can stay healthy for you guys. He's a ballerina that makes things happen.

 

All of that said, Kuddos to you for starting up this thread. I will definitely be checking it often, and it could be really fun as this season progresses. I don't often get to play golf with lacrosse people given where I am, but this is a good little alternative to talking shop on the course.

[CrabDaddy]

KBrown, I see where you're coming from and can appreciate that. It's been good lacrosse we've seen, as well. Part of my issue w/early games also stems from the big picture. The pressure to win, that you have in football and basketball, is creeping into lacrosse, so coaches don't want to schedule 2 games/week. Championship is always Memorial Day, so they play in February. (I know, there's always been pressure to win, but... you know what I mean?)

I didn't see the JHU v Loyola game, but,against Navy, Petro was using much less 2 man game w/Shack than last year. Maybe Tinney in the lineup means the offense initiates with the midfield more. I like how they are playing him on the wing on FOs - a threat right away w/possession instead of a complete line change.

Your man Garnsey with some impressive games! He's filling some big shoes nicely!

Was wondering how Denver would do losing Zach Miller... that's not fair to have a Freshman step up like that, LOL!

My Terps need all the defensive help they can get. They'll be fine by the end of the season, but losing Dunn, Danseglio, and Bernlohr hurts! Most of the offense returned. They moved Rotanz (his Pop is a hoot!) to mid. Henningsen with more experience at FOGO. Different animal than the 2015, 2016 offense that has been the best argument for a shot clock, LOL.

I hope we can keep this thread active. The forums on IL.com and Laxpower never seem to have much back and forth (at least when I have checked them out) ... oh, except for tutorials on how to dye heads and string pockets in a Proton Power, lol... and topics about coaching die on the vine after a day or two. Good to hear from you! Hope you have a great season!

[warfelg]

Personally I always liked the early start to the season.

 

1 from a player standpoint - more time between games which means injury and game recovery is better

2 from a coaching standpoint - more time to gameplan between games, which means more competitive games

2 from a HS Coach standpoint - lets me see more games and develop more plays for my team

 

I won't lie - much of my coaching 'playbook' (lets be real, how many of us have actual plays outside of EMO?) has come from what different college teams do. I call my 1-4-1 "Michigan" as they run it and I've developed how we do it off what they do. "Hopkins" 2-3-1 (I count Midfield to X) same thing. "Denver" is our open 2-2-2. And so on. We got UNC, PSU, Duke too. So within all those offensive sets we have "plays" that I coach my players to "auto start" based on who has a certain matchup at a part of the field. Some of the "plays" aren't to score, but to manipulate the defense to get us a matchup I rather see. Some are just to get players into position. Some are to score.

 

I know it sounds like my playbook is overly complicated, but it really isn't. For example "Michigan Blue" of "Michigan (Odd Number)" is just designed to get the shorties in on the crease, get the LP's on the edges, then we run wing pick and pop/pick and roll untill something works. Michigan Yellow or Even number is an outside rotation; which I might use to get an attackman with a shorty up to the point spot. "Denver Mile" is a 2-2-2 where the players slide back and forth to pull the 'weakside' more towards the middle. "Denver Peak" is keeping the 2-2-2 open and spread out; and this is typically our timekiller offense. Up late or looking to run out the clock, this is great for forcing a slide to come from far far away.

 

Where I've lucked out at a few stops, is there was great interest in making the entire program on the same page top to bottom. So players in the programs I've been with are taught all these same offensive nomenclature from their early days, so unless they are new players in HS, they should know it so I can worry about the coaching of minute details within these offenses and how to react, as opposed to teaching the actual offense and staying very generic.

[CrabDaddy]

Personally I always liked the early start to the season.

 

1 from a player standpoint - more time between games which means injury and game recovery is better

2 from a coaching standpoint - more time to gameplan between games, which means more competitive games

2 from a HS Coach standpoint - lets me see more games and develop more plays for my team

 

I won't lie - much of my coaching 'playbook' (lets be real, how many of us have actual plays outside of EMO?) has come from what different college teams do. I call my 1-4-1 "Michigan" as they run it and I've developed how we do it off what they do. "Hopkins" 2-3-1 (I count Midfield to X) same thing. "Denver" is our open 2-2-2. And so on. We got UNC, PSU, Duke too. So within all those offensive sets we have "plays" that I coach my players to "auto start" based on who has a certain matchup at a part of the field. Some of the "plays" aren't to score, but to manipulate the defense to get us a matchup I rather see. Some are just to get players into position. Some are to score.

 

I know it sounds like my playbook is overly complicated, but it really isn't. For example "Michigan Blue" of "Michigan (Odd Number)" is just designed to get the shorties in on the crease, get the LP's on the edges, then we run wing pick and pop/pick and roll untill something works. Michigan Yellow or Even number is an outside rotation; which I might use to get an attackman with a shorty up to the point spot. "Denver Mile" is a 2-2-2 where the players slide back and forth to pull the 'weakside' more towards the middle. "Denver Peak" is keeping the 2-2-2 open and spread out; and this is typically our timekiller offense. Up late or looking to run out the clock, this is great for forcing a slide to come from far far away.

 

Where I've lucked out at a few stops, is there was great interest in making the entire program on the same page top to bottom. So players in the programs I've been with are taught all these same offensive nomenclature from their early days, so unless they are new players in HS, they should know it so I can worry about the coaching of minute details within these offenses and how to react, as opposed to teaching the actual offense and staying very generic.

Depends on what you call a "play", lol. One of our local coaches had a pretty extensive playbook, but the plays were all a variation or twist to the base offense. The 2-3-1 version I'm most familiar with is one great big play, LOL. At the level I'm coaching, U13-U15, the players don't move very well off-ball, so I had to give it a name - instead of saying run the triangle offense, we run "Iroquois"... which at least gets us a dodge, a look to the crease, and a pass to X, LOL.

I don't think plays have to be complicated as long as the off-ball guys can switch positions and create confusion about the second or third slide. One I borrowed from UMD was a simple 2 man game out of the 2-3-1 where the crease M steps out and sets a pick for a wing A. Usually the roll or slip is wide open. Off-ball, the middies switch, attack switch, so does the backside d-pole (filling to the crease) go with the picking middie? Back pipe fill would a middie, but his man is cutting toward the ball. The defense has to make a lot of decisions and communicate them.

[CrabDaddy]

Maryland survives a close one vs Yale, 12-11 w/2 lightening delays in the 4th qtr.

Hopkins rolls UNC, 13-5. Surprised that wasn't much closer!

Army with the last second goal to upset Syracuse! 14-13

Penn upsets UVA, 11-10

My biggest surprise is probably Stony Brook putting up 25 against Brown! After trouncing Quinnipiac, some folks were saying maybe Brown wasn't going to have much of a drop-off from last year after all. Or is Stony Brook that good? Next best opponent on SB's schedule is Albany.

[warfelg]

Personally I always liked the early start to the season.

 

1 from a player standpoint - more time between games which means injury and game recovery is better

2 from a coaching standpoint - more time to gameplan between games, which means more competitive games

2 from a HS Coach standpoint - lets me see more games and develop more plays for my team

 

I won't lie - much of my coaching 'playbook' (lets be real, how many of us have actual plays outside of EMO?) has come from what different college teams do. I call my 1-4-1 "Michigan" as they run it and I've developed how we do it off what they do. "Hopkins" 2-3-1 (I count Midfield to X) same thing. "Denver" is our open 2-2-2. And so on. We got UNC, PSU, Duke too. So within all those offensive sets we have "plays" that I coach my players to "auto start" based on who has a certain matchup at a part of the field. Some of the "plays" aren't to score, but to manipulate the defense to get us a matchup I rather see. Some are just to get players into position. Some are to score.

 

I know it sounds like my playbook is overly complicated, but it really isn't. For example "Michigan Blue" of "Michigan (Odd Number)" is just designed to get the shorties in on the crease, get the LP's on the edges, then we run wing pick and pop/pick and roll untill something works. Michigan Yellow or Even number is an outside rotation; which I might use to get an attackman with a shorty up to the point spot. "Denver Mile" is a 2-2-2 where the players slide back and forth to pull the 'weakside' more towards the middle. "Denver Peak" is keeping the 2-2-2 open and spread out; and this is typically our timekiller offense. Up late or looking to run out the clock, this is great for forcing a slide to come from far far away.

 

Where I've lucked out at a few stops, is there was great interest in making the entire program on the same page top to bottom. So players in the programs I've been with are taught all these same offensive nomenclature from their early days, so unless they are new players in HS, they should know it so I can worry about the coaching of minute details within these offenses and how to react, as opposed to teaching the actual offense and staying very generic.

Depends on what you call a "play", lol. One of our local coaches had a pretty extensive playbook, but the plays were all a variation or twist to the base offense. The 2-3-1 version I'm most familiar with is one great big play, LOL. At the level I'm coaching, U13-U15, the players don't move very well off-ball, so I had to give it a name - instead of saying run the triangle offense, we run "Iroquois"... which at least gets us a dodge, a look to the crease, and a pass to X, LOL.

I don't think plays have to be complicated as long as the off-ball guys can switch positions and create confusion about the second or third slide. One I borrowed from UMD was a simple 2 man game out of the 2-3-1 where the crease M steps out and sets a pick for a wing A. Usually the roll or slip is wide open. Off-ball, the middies switch, attack switch, so does the backside d-pole (filling to the crease) go with the picking middie? Back pipe fill would a middie, but his man is cutting toward the ball. The defense has to make a lot of decisions and communicate them.

 

I personally don't believe in 'plays'. Mostly because the idea of a 'play' to most my players meant you had to do that no matter what.

 

So myself an another coach developed what we call 'play sets'. We don't have an end goal to these. They are just a set and a movement. It's rather unique, but it got our players to think 'outside' the box, and react to what happens. Far too often in a drawn up play we saw our players force a pass despite it not being there. So we start with this idea of "ok we're going 2-3-1, this word means pick comes from the wing, this word means pick from the crease, and this one means pick off the ball from crease to middie." The very first time a player asked "what next?" I responded with one word: "React".

 

About the light went off in 2/5ths of my team right away. The rest of the team said "Oh it's never going to work". 3 of my star players said there's no way that it will create goals. I told them to just wait.

 

The first game, we won 13-7. After, on the bus, I asked them to analyze what worked and what made them go from a 4 goal a game team to scoring 13. One of the players that came up to me before, questioning the method, said "I reacted." I asked him to elaborate. He went on to add: "For the first time playing, I didn't actively think about what the next step of the play was. I wasn't concerned about where to go with the ball. I took it, went at the pick, and all the sudden I could see the field. There was no tunnel vision on the roll. I saw the slide from crease and knew that's where to go with the ball."

 

To me that was the revelation that I ditched a full on "playbook" and just went to "set triggers".

 

The way we implement it as a team is we gameplan. Over the first 2:00 of possession we go with an open set and do some passing, running, picks, tosses to see if they are in man or zone. I'll call time out. As a team we then know what defense they are in and what sets will work (some are designed for man like 2-2-2, 2-3-1 and some for zone like 1-4-1, tight 2-2-2), and we figure out who the weak parts of the defense are. So we set it like this: Hopkins 3 Blue. That's after 3 times around the horn the pick comes from the crease to the man at X. Count starts with the man at X and every touch by him counts as 1. That one is if we realize the crease defender is a hitter, but slow. We're trying to get him into space. The wing attack men will widen and get high, so will the up top middies. This forces a slide to come from far away. Now all the X man has to do is react to what the defense does with the pick.

 

Personally I feel like this has freed me up as a coach. I don't have to spend a hole heck of a lot of time worrying about what plays to call, and trying to make something work. I'm just letting do what the defense is giving me. It allows me to better watch the defensive side of the ball, communicate with players on the bench, and talk to refs more.

 

It also means we can really work on other issues that we are seeing as opposed to trying to perfect plays.

 

Sorry if that's too much or too in depth. But I'm a nut about coaching.

[Srixon-Ian]

I played goalie in Lacrosse throughout high school in Michigan. Won two state titles, had some D3 interest, but I hated practice. Having my knees blown up by rubber going 90 mph took its toll, I couldn't see 4 years of it at an even higher level.

 

My HS team didn't run plays, we had schemes and everyone had a responsibility. It was more of one of those choose your own adventure books. The big emphasis we had was getting possession after a missed shot, on both sides of the field. You either get another offensive possession or eliminate one of theirs.

 

My HS had one guy go to Army, he was a Man Up specialist for them. I would say the only time to have "plays" is man up.

[CrabDaddy]

 

Good stuff, warfelg! I like it!

I don't think there are too many folks who think the offense should be totally scripted. You want kids with a high lacrosse IQ, not just really good at running plays. You certainly don't want a play that ends in the ball carrier forcing a shot or a pass because he's left with that as his only option. To be redundant, lol, I think it depends on what you call a play. There almost always need to be rules of movement so players are spaced properly and know what to look for. Our youth program ran a basic 2-3-1 triangle motion offense from day 1. Pass and cut, pass and cut, ... and kids became tentative about shooting, but overly-aggressive about feeding cutters. When I took on a middle school team, I went to a coaching clinic at UMD where Tom Rotanz (Shoreham-Wading River) was presenting about drills that mimicked the offense. He ran through the whole progression - middie dodges to shoot, dodge to feed, dodge-pass to X-bang it to the back side, etc... and I thought, "That's one great big play". It may be considered a "play set", but every ball movement (dodge or pass) had options along with it, so each player knows what to look for, especially the initial dodger who has 5 options. If there's no quality shot opportunity, you re-set and do it again from the other middie or from X.

That may considered a play, a play set, or something else, but I found, at my level anyway, having a set point in space and time of initiating the offense took away some confusion. Without that starting point I kept seeing players dodge into a double team because the adjacent offensive player didn't recognize the dodge coming and clear through.

Even with that "choreography", I always told players not to be afaid of taking advantage of opportunities (a defender is out of position, physical mismatch) and to look for their shots.

Some of the plays another coach ran were really just a twist on the basic offensive motion - e.g. with the X attack dodging, the wing A would normally clear through the crease, but if they are running Curly, he sets a pick for the crease middie. Stuff like that - same offense, add a wrinkle.

LOL! Ironically, EMO is where I typically do not like plays. I like a 3-3-3 (really a 1-2-1-2), and it's all about ball movement. Bang it across the top - if the D is trying to play 2v3, one of the wings will be open or slide comes up from low post, which opens low post or the skip. - if D is stringing the crease, it should open up the crease or the skip (especially if the point can bait that stringing D to take an extra step higher). Exception would be a little wheel play out of the 3-3-3 or start 1-4-1 and morph to 3-3-3.

[warfelg]

I'mm be honest - I've made my team drop the thought of a 'play' entirely.

 

We got what we call "Offensive sets", and "motion go's". Because so many kids play football these days they associate a "play" with something completely scripted. So I feel it's my job to kinda 're-educate' them. Let lacrosse happen. Plays, in my mind, were scripted to play at at time when many teams played zone, so you were coming up with ways to defeat them. Now, there's so many defensive variations that you just have to have an offensive flow and see where the opportunities are.

 

Speaking of that defensive stuff here's a good one:

I coach to zone when a player is at X but man as soon as the pass comes up above GLE. Why? When he's at X, he's not a shooter so I'm coaching my guys to take away his passing lanes. But when the ball is up, everyone is a shooter, so I don't want to risk anyone uncovered. And heck when it goes to the wing we even go to a man-zone hybrid. Same in pick and roll situations. It's a strange man-zone hybrid where we are zoning the action but manning the play.

[CrabDaddy]

That defensive scheme sounds complicated. But, if it works and your guys can communicate it... Adjacent defenders have skip pass responsibility anyway. I'd hate to leave a good passer with time and his hands free while the defense is swivelling 180 degrees. I'd be much more inclined to leave a guy alone at X if he's looking to score off the dodge. You ever have teams overload the zone or off-ball pick while you're zoned up? Does one defender have responsibility for the man at X, and he just doesn't go below GLE, or do your low defenders keep to either side and fill cross-crease when the ball moves up?

The only thing we do that could be similar is zone a double crease. Crease defenders have L/R or H/L responsibility and bookend the offensive crease players.

[warfelg]

That defensive scheme sounds complicated. But, if it works and your guys can communicate it... Adjacent defenders have skip pass responsibility anyway. I'd hate to leave a good passer with time and his hands free while the defense is swivelling 180 degrees. I'd be much more inclined to leave a guy alone at X if he's looking to score off the dodge. You ever have teams overload the zone or off-ball pick while you're zoned up? Does one defender have responsibility for the man at X, and he just doesn't go below GLE, or do your low defenders keep to either side and fill cross-crease when the ball moves up?

The only thing we do that could be similar is zone a double crease. Crease defenders have L/R or H/L responsibility and bookend the offensive crease players.

 

We double zone off post with a guy at X. If they go wide at X we go back to man. Realistically all I'm doing with the zone with ball at X is not getting beat from behind to not slide from X. Middies drop as low as cuts go. In reality you still do things like it's man.

 

I guess the best way to explain it is I developed this as a way to avoid having my defender get tripped up on the net. So zoning the man at X puts a LP on either side of the cage, and once that X guy gets to what I call Crease Extended and declares the side he's attacking (by getting to 45 degrees from GLE to straight back) we man up at that point.

 

Really the goal is pack in tight, create a picket fence, keep cutters outside the distance my Goalie feels comfortable stopping a ball. And in all honesty it was one of my ex-Goalies that helped develop this. His simple comment was he wanted it so no cutters were inside 10 yards and the Man at X wasn't able to get free on the crease.

 

The "zone-man" of picks. As soon as they go into a pick, we "zone trap" where one guy has the pick side, other man has the backside. Ideally the pick side guy will play high, push the ball carrier back into the pick, and the backside guy comes for a trap. If the pick side defender can't turn the guy back, the backside man has the pick man. It's a zone trap, where each defender knows who their man is leaving the mesh point without having to communicate.

[warfelg]

I get that the defense sounds way more complicated on paper than in person. If I could draw it I think it would make much more sense. I'll try to draw some pictures and get them online so I can link it for you.

[CrabDaddy]

Oh baby!!! Some heavyweight matchups this weekend!

Maryland vs Notre Dame, North Carolina vs Denver, and Virginia vs Syracuse

Last year's UMD-ND game was a great defensive battle. This year may be the opposite.

After getting hammered last week by JHU, can UNC go to Denver and pull off an upset? Pretty tall order.

 

 

Some other interesting matchups:

The battle for Pennsylvannia - Penn vs PSU. Penn, fresh off their upset of UVA. Penn St, ranked #5, with the top two point scorers in D1.

Brown vs Rutgers. The Bears averaging 21 goals/game. Scarlet Knights are 4-0.

Air Force vs Boston U. Terriers are 5-0!

 

Who do you like?

In the marquee games, I'm picking UMD, Denver, and Syracuse

[CrabDaddy]

D3 action this weekend:

6 Gettysburg vs 11 Stevenson

4 Ithaca vs 12 RPI

1 Salisbury vs 13 Ohio Wesleyan

2 Tufts vs 20 Stevens

[warfelg]

D3 action this weekend:

6 Gettysburg vs 11 Stevenson

4 Ithaca vs 12 RPI

1 Salisbury vs 13 Ohio Wesleyan

2 Tufts vs 20 Stevens

 

Those 4 games include 17 players I have coached in fall ball, indoor, Varsity, or elite team settings.

[CrabDaddy]

D3 action this weekend:

6 Gettysburg vs 11 Stevenson

4 Ithaca vs 12 RPI

1 Salisbury vs 13 Ohio Wesleyan

2 Tufts vs 20 Stevens

 

Those 4 games include 17 players I have coached in fall ball, indoor, Varsity, or elite team settings.

Wow! Which team has the most?

[CrabDaddy]

Good grief! Johns Hopkins looked like a championship contender last week, beating up on UNC. Today they taken behind the woodshed by unranked Princeton. Michael Sowers and Austin Sims really put on a clinic today. Didn't see that coming at all.

[warfelg]

D3 action this weekend:

6 Gettysburg vs 11 Stevenson

4 Ithaca vs 12 RPI

1 Salisbury vs 13 Ohio Wesleyan

2 Tufts vs 20 Stevens

 

Those 4 games include 17 players I have coached in fall ball, indoor, Varsity, or elite team settings.

Wow! Which team has the most?

 

Salisbury with 7 of them.