US Lacrosse Magazine July 2007

by **Timbalaned** on Tue Jul 10, 2007 3:14 pm

So are we going to get no love in the magazine anymore since we broke away from them? All the other championships were covered in this issue but ours, was kind of disappointed.

**Sponsor**

by **Danny Hogan** on Tue Jul 10, 2007 3:23 pm

you answered your own question.

by **Phantanimal** on Tue Jul 10, 2007 3:30 pm

Ha... I thought the same thing. As I was flipping past the men's and women's JUCO title game articles I thought the MCLA article was going to be next... Nope! WDIA and then the top high school team in the USL Women's Division National Tournament. Not even a mention of the MCLA in the whole July edition... messed up!

by **John Paul** on Thu Jul 12, 2007 12:18 pm

If you are members of US Lacrosse, I suggest sending notes about your concern to them.

by **buffalowill** on Thu Jul 12, 2007 2:51 pm

...I already did JP. Too bad the governing body of lacrosse throws out coverage of the MCLA championships based on politics.

by **seulax10** on Tue Jul 17, 2007 12:19 pm

I emailed the magazine about it, and I received an email from Paul Krome, Editor and Assistant Director of Communications. He replied:

Thanks for your note. We did include some coverage of the MCLA championships in our August issue (at press now), but you’re right, we probably should’ve devoted some space in our July issue for more coverage. I heard the events went well. Glad to hear it.

So, I'll be looking forward to the August issue.

by **agentogden** on Tue Jul 17, 2007 12:57 pm

Funny that after basically telling US Lacrosse that they stink at running our tournament and taking it back everyone complains about not getting coverage in their lame, look what we do for kids, magazine.

US Lacrosse mag is like The Watchtower.

Out.
AO

by **Danny Hogan** on Tue Jul 17, 2007 2:25 pm

regardless i would bet the MCLA still has more USL members than a good portion of the other lax they cover.

by **BigheadTodd** on Tue Jul 17, 2007 5:50 pm

Did lax magazine do any stories on the NECLL? How about the NCLL? Technically, the NECLL has been around just as long as the MCLA, and the NCLL has been around much longer. There are alot of ways to look at this, but bottom line is US Lacrosse is probably just trying to prove a point. A wise man's FAQ once said "My house, My rules".

by **Pinball** on Wed Jul 18, 2007 9:05 am

Does US Lacrosse have anything to do with the NCAA tournaments??

by **LaxRef** on Wed Jul 18, 2007 12:16 pm

Pinball wrote:Does US Lacrosse have anything to do with the NCAA tournaments??

Does ESPN the Magazine? No, but IIRC they cover some NCAA Lacrosse and not MCLA lacrosse.

I think it is universally accepted that NCAA lacrosse is—at least currently—a higher level of lacrosse with more fan appeal. Perhaps US Lacrosse was more interested in promoting MCLA lacrosse when they were part of US Lacrosse as USLIA. Can you really blame them for reducing the coverage?

by **Kevin OBrien** on Wed Jul 18, 2007 6:16 pm

For reducing coverage? Yep. It would be different if we never had any coverage in it at all. Keep in mind that they did continue to cover the women's side as well.

by **BigheadTodd** on Wed Jul 18, 2007 7:43 pm

Just out of curiosity, did anyone submit a story for publication? Was the WDIA's article written by a Lacrosse magazine staffer, or was it written by a WDIA member that sent it in? I have to agree with AO, the magazine is kind of lame, just like IL is one big warrior ad. To be honest, the only reason why I had a membership was for the Coaches Convention.

by **LaxRef** on Wed Jul 18, 2007 8:51 pm

From an official's perspective, the magazine doesn't offer much. Men's officials used to get one page every issue. Now we get one page every other issue.

I try to avoid reading stuff like pre-season rankings and predictions because I don't want to be influenced by who is "supposed to be good."

by **Jana** on Wed Jul 18, 2007 9:22 pm

agentogden wrote: everyone complains about not getting coverage in their lame, look what we do for kids, magazine.

Hey, every organization has room to improve, and there are sports that didn't get enough press. But if you want kids to learn lacrosse as kids, and show up at your college with strong fundamentals, lots of game experience, and a strong sense of sportsmanship - then USL is doing their best to make that happen.

Who else is offering the grants, equipment donations, rules education, etc? Seriously - I don't see the MCLA, or IL or the NCAA taking on these initiatives in such a powerful way.

Think of it this way - if you paid $50 for 1 service - just getting the magazine, and USL put all of their financial resources into producing the magazine - then the product would be considerably better.

Damn, when I think of it, what a shoddy product we get from Sports Illustrated for the price, when you consider how little gets covered outside of NBA, MLB and NFL.

But in reality, probably $10 is spent on the US Lacrosse magazine, and the other $40 is spent on developing the sport through grants, education, website support, rules development and interp, umpires, national teams, hall of fame, runs a convention for 5000+ people, and a variety of other initiatives. Lacrosse has exploded in the last 5 years around the country and US Lacrosse is doing their best to help it grow.

There is never enough money to go around. Would it have been cool to see more MCLA coverage in the July issue? YES, I noticed it was missing too. Does USL have limited staff and travel budgets to cover all the various championships in May and June - YES, as far as I can tell, they don't have a money tree growing in the back of the office.

Does this sound like I'm an employee of US Lacrosse? Well, I'm not. But I worked for USRowing a few years ago, and for a $65 fee (instead of $50 at USL) they have NO magazine, NO grants, NO equipment donations, NO rules interp for coaches, a primitive website compared to US Lacrosse, and they run a convention for 200 people. They do run 3 national championships and a couple of regional championships (which I used to direct). They also spend $250,000 per year on average litigating with national team members or would-be national team members because of disputed selection procedures. Don't believe me? Check out their IRS Form 990 for 2006 to see the legal fees.

why would anyone join USRowing? You had to in order to compete in the regional and national championships. The toll to cross the road, so to speak. But we'd all feel better about if they offered as many services as USL does to grow the sport.

If you want to see the sport grow, if you want kids to show up at college with some lacrosse skills, if you want to see more parity in the MCLA, if you want to access USL resources on their website, if you want a national organization to run multiple national teams (and yet keep the national teams from dominating the agenda - or costing lots of lawyer money), if you want to play different teams when you go to summer tournaments, because now lacrosse is popular in a new area and they are sending teams to Vail and Tahoe and Lake Placid -- then join USL.

Not all the services come back directly to you, it's an investment on the lacrosse community's future. I don't see many other lacrosse organizations out there that perform all the initiatives that USL takes on.

So far, the NWWLA hasn't authorized the funds for me to purchase a shotgun to hold to your head, to force you to join USL. So right now, it's purely voluntary. Join if you want to. Or don't. But quit complaining.