UWSP not playing out of conference games this year?

[Gooseguy10]

The perception of the b division is that of a JV league. With the best teams playing in A division, B will always been seen as a lesser talent level. Whether this is warranted or not is debatable.

[DwinsChamps]

\Stevens point as i recall were one of the top teams in the umll two years ago.\

...in the infancy of the conference, SP was one of the top teams. Then, having two good offensive players would mean prominence within the conference. SP is a shell of the team you speak of. Last spring they lost to us, UW-Eau Claire, and we are what Rob would consider one of the ghetto teams that would remain if St. Thomas and St. John's elevated to the A division.

St. Thomas and St. John's are predominantly adding the "rich" and talented MN highschool laxers that don't leave the state. Look at the growth they've respectively experienced in the last few years. In years to come they will only improve exponentially, as highschoolers realize that they can play high-level lacrosse at these schools. At such a rate, the "Saints" will be able to win conference games entirely with their backups.

Yet, a move to the A division, while, both the A and B entities of the conference would benefit, would leave them lower on the national totem pole. But, if I were Mr. Graff, Mr. Hellenack, or Mr. Moosbrugger, why wouldn't I want to switch up the conferences? For fear of a power change.

[Adam G]

The B division I think as a whole is great... Although I'd maybe side with the name change to numerals, but that's a different point.

When was the last time that the UMLL-A had two teams ranked consistently in the top 10 nationally, while holding down more or less a lock on the rest of the teams in their division for almost two years straight?

If a level playing field is the aim, what team remains in what division shouldn't remain static. Not after one or two "bad years", but if a team is consistently uncompetitive in that division, or conversely a team is dominant for a number of years, maybe a change should be discussed. I don't want to use examples, but you can't say that team "A", a perpetual lower 1/3rd finisher, wouldn't be more competitive in a different division with a more competitive level of play.

[Reilly]

This might get a little long...so, sorry
First, in response to DWINS CHAMPS. SJU and UST are look good on a national scale because they go compete with Top 20 Competition, not because the beat an unranked, in-conference opponent. I questions whether the "B" Division would be better if SJU and UST moved up. Not to mention, I dont think a 6 team "B Division" gets a AQ. Would the "B Division" be more competitive? Probably. But better? I would have to say no. Say you are the backup goalie to a guy who clearly has more skills that you and is the same year in school. The only way you get the start is if you become better than him, however you do that (practice, conditioning, coaching etc.). The starter leaves and you have the same skills as before. Does that make the team better? I would say it is a downgrade. Take that analogy and use 8 Goalies (8 UMLL B Teams) with the Starter and first backup leaving. Has the group, as a whole gotten better? To me it looks similar to what has happened in the WCLL B.

As far as moving up/down is concerned, I think the Top 10 and probably a few more B Teams could run with a lot of the A Division. But look @ the NCAA. The Salisbury's, Middlebury's and Cortlands of D3 could probably give Holy Cross, Colgate and UVM (mid to low level D1) a run for their money. I think the A/B split is about the quantity of men on campus to draw from. The U of M has many more men to play than UWEC or SJU. You could use the WCLL as an example of successful B teams moving up, and being fairly successful (i.e. Claremont recieving votes in the A Polls). But California is 10 years ahead of MN as far as youth and HS lax is concerned. Hence they draw from a deeper well. Therefore I think SJU and UST belong in the UMLL B, we are small schools, D3 across the board.

I think the level of play in the UMLL B and MCLA B grow as the sport grows in MN and NAtioanlly. If that is the case the outlook is good.
Growth is what I believe will produce the level playing field DWINSCHAMPS is lobbying for.

[DwinsChamps]

Mr. Reilly, while I see the point you are trying to make, I'm struggling with your goalie analogy, as it's hard to compare multiple goalies on the same team with multiple teams in the same conference. I'd bet that the lousy goalies would prefer an opportunity to play over feeling good for the better goalie's success. Let's look at the analogy this way...

Say you're a goalie on "Team A division", one of only two goalies who has any talent. Now, you can be happy with being considerably better than all of the other goalies on your team year after year, or perhaps, you could know that by swapping the two worst goalies out with the two best goalies from another team in the same situation, you would be making your team better as a whole. At the same time, you be giving the lousy goalies something to play for.

And as far as being "D3 across the board", while St.T/St.J's is indeed D3, they draw their talent not from the school persay, but from the state as a whole. The talent you teams depend upon comes from highschoolers, not college students picking up the sport for the first time.

Rich, talented highschool lacrosse players want to go to private schools with good lacrosse. Since many of the top-tier laxers in MN highschools are rich kids from rich communities, they'll look to move to St. John's and St. Thomas to play, when they could just as easily go to public UW-Eau Claire or Mankato, which is a larger school than any in the B division.

[Pinball]

And as far as being "D3 across the board", while St.T/St.J's is indeed D3, they draw their talent not from the school persay, but from the state as a whole. The talent you teams depend upon comes from highschoolers, not college students picking up the sport for the first time.

Rich, talented highschool lacrosse players want to go to private schools with good lacrosse. Since many of the top-tier laxers in MN highschools are rich kids from rich communities, they'll look to move to St. John's and St. Thomas to play, when they could just as easily go to public UW-Eau Claire or Mankato, which is a larger school than any in the B division.

I guess all of us are rich kids from Bearpath and Edina who drive our Lexus' to class in the summer and our Escalades in the winter (keep in mind both are rollin' on 22"). SJU does cost a lot more then UWEC, but supposedly we are getting a better education because of the fee we pay. There are very few kids at SJU that do not recieve Financial Aid or some sort of grant/loan package. If you think about your argument, Why is Duluth good year after year dont they pull from the same schools??

We only have 7 kids from private schools. Hardly say thats a majority of our roster.

Our team started back in 1987- from 1987 to 2003 we were the laughing stock of College Lacrosse. In that time span we maybe won 3 or 4 games. In 2003 Dan Genck turned this program around, found a coach hounded the university and got us to where we were at today. Last year we had 4 seniors (all saw the field a lot) who did not play a drop of high school lax till they got to college. The key is to find athletes not average joes off the street.

Get organized and find athletes, Eau Claire is a school of 10,063, SJU has an enrollment 1,909.

[DwinsChamps]

I guess all of us are rich kids

No, although many lacrosse players who attend private schools are.

Why is Duluth good year after year dont they pull from the same schools??

Yes, but Duluth is A) more established, and B) pulling in a different niche. UMD isn't considered "academically rigorous", so it provides a convenient situation for many highschool lacrosse players who don't have the option of attending the UofM, St. John's, and Carleton.

Last year we had 4 seniors (all saw the field a lot) who did not play a drop of high school lax till they got to college. The key is to find athletes not average joes off the street.

Now that these senior are gone, who scores your goals and makes the plays? A team that is predominanty made of freshman and sophmores. And as the league becomes more established, it's going to take highschool products to remain competitive. Your leading scorers, same as St. Thomas', have highschool experience.

Get organized and find athletes, Eau Claire is a school of 10,063, SJU has an enrollment 1,909.

It's hard to draw the talented kids from the likes of Blake and Eden Prarie when you lack the hype of an in-state private school with a coach that actively recruits. We face the same problems as Steven's Point, NDSU, and others in the conference. Good athletes only take you so far. Eventually experience gets you victories against stacked opponents like St. Thomas and St. John's. Yet, as reality has it, there is an experience descrepancy within the conference that has created an uneven playing field, so to speak.

[Gross]

DwinsChamps,
I think that you touched on the solution for the "parity" in the B league in your last post: experienced high school players. I am confident that anyone in the UST or SJU lacrosse program will attribute, at least in part, the rapid improvement of both these clubs over the past few years to the growth of lacrosse at the MN high school level. High school playing experience was a rare commodity to have at St. Thomas when I started playing my freshman year in 2001. By my senior year in 2005, it was almost expected. If you look at the growing success of the top UMLL teams, Duluth, UST, SJU, they have been fortunate to pull this in-state talent and experience. As lacrosse as a sport continues to grow in the other states of the UMLL at the high school level, I would expect the schools in WI, ND, and IA to be able to draw better, more experienced players. It is a process that will take time, but one that I am confident will happen, and one that will happen nation-wide (southeast, southwest, lower midwest, etc.) as the sport continues to grow nationally.
As for SJU and UST taking all the MN talent, I would argue that these teams are doing a very good job at recruiting the players that would fit into what the school, as a whole, has to offer: excellent academics, a Catholic education, and an active campus life, including sports. While I can't speak for SJU, I think you would be hard-pressed to find a UST player that came purely for the opportunity to play high-level lacrosse.

[Rob Graff]

I've made my argument on this topic. But to conclude - the ultimate question is what is the B division's purpose.

Mike wants it to be a ghetto of under achieving or (apparently in his world) financially poor teams that stay there, forever to toil in the background until they magically become an A team. As Mr. Reilly pointed out, in Mike's conceptual framework, the process on how those suddenly marginalized teams become an "A" team isn't that well defined. And also as Mr. Reilly notes, if Mike's plan were to be followed - the remaining teams don't suddenly become good. They still have to work for it.

I, and I believe the CCLA, GRLC, PNCLL, PCLL, RMLC and SELC, along with the executive board of the UMLL, view the B division as something other than Mike does. I'm not sure what is the LSA's perception of B. And I think the WCLL views it as Mike does. But they are the minority. To the majority, it is something that allows smaller schools that have smaller populations and less resources to compete on an even playing field with others such schools.

UST and SJU are to be commended because they have been leaders in altering the national perception of the B division from developmental to just different. If other UMLL schools don't want to follow in that path - that is fine. They can act as they wish within the boundries of the UMLL and MCLA. But if those schools that have been pioneers in that league want to stay there, and reap the benefits of their hard work by playing other like minded schools across the country, with what authority do you claim the right to stop them?

[DwinsChamps]

I'm unsure how the term "ghetto" was repeatedly thrown into my argument, but whatever the case, I'm not looking for B teams to "magically become" A teams, as Rob has said. Would the teams in the background be toiling less, or more if a shift occured? Instead of "toiling" in the B division after a UST/SJU elevation, the remaining teams would find themselves competing for the conference and actually moving AWAY FROM THE BACKGROUND, and would find the situation not ghetto, but advantageous for the goals of club lacrosse at their institutions, which I assure you, are not to be "blown out" by the same teams every year.

Not to mention, the conference season for UST/SJU would become pertinent if a move were to happen. With the growth of MN highschool lacrosse, within a few years these teams would be competing again for national stakes, of course, with "other like minded schools across the country."

If you, Rob, and the rest of the "majority" say that you embrace the B division as an even playing field that have smaller populations and less resources, then you would be contradicting reality. I don't, and never have considered the teams in the B division as "jv" developmental organizations whose goals should be to rise out of poverty and into the A ranks. In fact, I believe, and I think that my opinion is obvious, that I support an even playing field that embraces good competition. With that authority, and as a player of this conference, I claim the right to have the opinion that competition and even playing fields would benefit the teams of our conference. I too commend UST and SJU for their national prominence, but after playing for a highschool team that went 48-4 over three seasons, I would prefer playing a competitive conference schedule over a cupcake schedule, and the teams that we were beating 15-1 would agree.

[Gooseguy10]

While I agree in today's league pre college experience is almost a must in the top tier teams, I am not sure it is the magic ingredient for a successful program. As one of the previous posts stated pre-college lacrosse experience was all but unheard of in the UMLL prior to 2001. However, Duluth was dominant for 6 years before hs lacrosse was established in Minnesota. So what conclusion can be drawn? There is more to building a successful program than simply finding guys with years of lacrosse experience.

So how did Duluth do it without expereience? They went out and found athletes, worked hard and found a coach. Through that they established a good program that players would want to come and play for.

If I were on a lower tier team I would desperately try to find good athletes on campus and build a good core of guys that are willing to put time and effort into creating a quality program. It is true the top lacrosse players are still going to go to UMD, SJU and STU, but with the explosion of lacrosse in MN there are plenty of good players to go around. By building a quality program on core principals such as dedication, hard work and coaching, you will see more hs kids wanting to attend your school to play lacrosse. And by combining kids with prior experience and the other positive aspects of your program, your team will see the benefits of being more competitive while attracting more and more hs athletes each year. Each successful team in the UMLL has gone through very similar baby steps on their way to becoming a top tier team.

[DwinsChamps]

While I agree in today's league pre college experience is almost a must in the top tier teams, I am not sure it is the magic ingredient for a successful program. As one of the previous posts stated pre-college lacrosse experience was all but unheard of in the UMLL prior to 2001. However, Duluth was dominant for 6 years before hs lacrosse was established in Minnesota. So what conclusion can be drawn? There is more to building a successful program than simply finding guys with years of lacrosse experience.

So how did Duluth do it without expereience? They went out and found athletes, worked hard and found a coach. Through that they established a good program that players would want to come and play for.

And whom was Duluth dominant against? 6 years before 2001 there was NO competition in the UMLL, and lacrosse had hardly been embraced by the midwest. In such a stage, finding and training good athletes is the best you can do. In TODAY'S WORLD, the one we're living in, the kegs have been removed from the sidelines and the experienced athletes take the cake.

My 8th grade year, in 2000, a bunch of guys in my town established a club team on pure athleticism. By 2005 we had won our third state championship and were beating athletic teams with our skill and experience. I'd be surprised if Kevin Bice was as good as he is now had he not have played on that highschool team. But, in a world where your opponents have skill and experience, it takes more to be consistently dominant. Finding athletic guys has helped Eau Claire in recent years, but until experienced highschool kids start playing, we'll always be behind the UST's and the SJU's.

[Rob Graff]

[You] say that you embrace the B division as an even playing field that have smaller populations and less resources, then you would be contradicting reality. I don't, and never have considered the teams in the B division as "jv" developmental organizations whose goals should be to rise out of poverty and into the A ranks. In fact, I believe, and I think that my opinion is obvious, that I support an even playing field that embraces good competition.

And there's where your argument fails. You want competition between resulting from the SJU/UST leaving - not from other programs improving. Your argument suggests the uneven playing field is created by those teams already being good - Yet as the SJU/UST posters have noted (and I mean no disrespect by quoting them) - they were not good a few years ago. And your argument also suggests that UWEC and other public institutions cannot compete with destination institutions such as SJU/UST. Bull. Those teams went and obtained coaches. Then, they listened to the coaches. Then they worked. Then they traveled. Then they won. Which one of these steps can other B programs not do?

Mankato has a proud history - the were the first UMLL team to go to the (then) USLIA national championship. Yet they've had a couple of tough years. How did they react? By observing other programs that are successful and emulating them - and now they are on the rebound. They found a coach who is passionate about learning and about the program. They are organized. They have huge freshman class. They traveled to Michigan and, while losing, got their younger players valuable playing time. They are ACTING. Which one of these steps can other B programs not do?

Finally, your comment about HS ball intrigues me. My HS (Ward Melville HS) - was incredibly dominant while I was there - and continued that way for some time. 24 years ago (yes, bring on the old man jokes) we beat teams like Northport and Huntington badly, and without remorse. Those teams had a choice - they could either complain about us, give up or they could work. They decided to work, with the result being that they improved. NOW Huntington is the best team on the Island (you have not idea how much that hurt to write) and one of the top in the country, and Northport is now consistently competitive, and producing wonderful D1 players. And note - it didn't take 25 years for those teams to improve - those and others turned it around much faster than that.


Rob

[Rob Graff]

6 years before 2001 there was NO competition in the UMLL, and lacrosse had hardly been embraced by the midwest. In such a stage, finding and training good athletes is the best you can do.

Wrong again.

1. The first winner of the UMLL was GAC. UMD was not a factor until 1994, when they lost in the championship game to Carleton.

2. Carleton was a subsequent winner (whom UMD lost to), and they had ALL east coast players with experience.

3. UMD's Championship games v. Mankato in the 90s were very close affairs, at least two of which were one goal affairs.

4. In the late 1990's, UMD lost to St. Johns in the regular season (and St. Johns was starting two attackmen with Out of Minnesota HS experience), and then - after 3 weeks of furious work, came back and won the championship.

The UMLL was quite competitive in the time period you note

[LaxTV_Admin]

I'm still not sold on Marquette. I witnessed their fall game against the UofM and saw Marquette play for the win while the U played their entire team, especially back-up's.

Please be certain you have your facts straight before making said accusations. Marquette played 7 freshman in that game, 3 of whom did not have any lacrosse experience before. Additionally, all of our players got playing time as they should in the fall. And for the record 3 of our 4 goals in that game came from freshman.

It is fine to be of the opinion we should move to the "B" division. However, do not say things which you know nothing about.