Welcome to "A Lacrosse Weekend" my weekly compilation of thoughts, ideas, stories, myths, truths, about the great game of lacrosse. I hope you enjoy it! 

Phi-Lacrosse-ophy Podcasts

Ted Suihkonen is the Director of Player Development for HC Locamotiv in a town 3.5 hours northeast of Moscow.  I started following Ted on Twitter and have been blown away by his tweets on coaching, learning, and teaching.  Ted talks about unlocking creativity in his players by not providing the answers.   

One part of our conversation that I found most profound was a story Ted told about watching his 8 year old son play in a small area 2v2 game.  Ted, sitting up in the stands, decided to write down on a note pad every skill he saw his young son execute in this little game.  One skill Ted described as a move with the puck where the boy squared up to his defender with skates facing out, right foot to the right and left foot to the left, giving him the ability to go in either direction.  I think of this in...

Welcome to "A Lacrosse Weekend" my weekly compilation of thoughts, ideas, stories, myths, truths, about the great game of lacrosse. I hope you enjoy it! 

Phi-Lacrosse-ophy Podcasts

Joe Keegan, PLL Writer and Stats Analyst: Joe is one of the best guys in the sport, i tireless worker, a student of the game and a self made man through his efforts in recording and analyzing stats.  And I love how much Joe loves lacrosse!  We talked about the genesis of analytics career and the impact of the late, great, Dave Huntley who was one of the first high profile coaches and lacrosse guys to take a deep dive into stats.  Hunts presented at the US Lacrosse convention, a study of 15,000 MLL shots in 2015 and 2016, looking at where the shot was taken and if it was right handed, left handed or behind the back.  This presentation, which proved shooting with your stick to the middle or not has a massive impact on shooting percentage, was a spring board for Joe Keegan's passion for lacrosse analytics.  Y...

Welcome to "A Lacrosse Weekend" my weekly compilation of thoughts, ideas, stories, myths, truths, about the great game of lacrosse. I hope you enjoy it! 

JM3 Athlete Program

There is one week and three spots remaining in a registration window to sign up for the JM3 Athlete Program.  In this program I work with athletes and families and put them on a trajectory of development and exposure that they would otherwise never know.   I have created a new model of player development that is so effective and such a breath of fresh air you may not believe it!  

For me, this is an exciting time of year to watch the newly minted summer highlight videos from my JM3 Athletes.  The free play model is manifested in improved confidence, poise, ability to slow down, the use of deception and a new repertoire of skills that the boys and girls players actually use in games!  In the Jm3 Athlete program we combine the joy and implicit learning of free play with the power of video.  

This is an investment...

Welcome to "A Lacrosse Weekend" my weekly compilation of thoughts, ideas, stories, myths, truths, about the great game of lacrosse. I hope you enjoy it! 

Phi-Lacrosse-ophy Podcast

After a two month summer hiatus, I am excited to announce that I have started season three of my series of podcasts and added a solo podcast to the package!

The Phi-Lacrosse-ophy Podcast is a one on one conversation primarily with coaches, but occasionally players or other special guests like my latest guest Terry Foy, CEO Inside Lacrosse.  Our conversation is all about college lacrosse recruiting in a COVID world.  Terry is one of the smartest and most informed people in the lacrosse world and you will want to hear his opinions on how coaches are handling recruiting with no in person evaluations or visits.  Finally, IL has a new product called the IL Video Evaluation which is an incredible product for boys and girls high school players as they need to know where they stand, what they need to work on, and ...

Welcome to "A Lacrosse Weekend" my weekly compilation of thoughts, ideas, stories, myths, truths, about the great game of lacrosse. I hope you enjoy it! 

PLL Championship Series

All I can say is wow!  The PLL Championship Series been such an oasis in a desert of quarantine and cancellations.  The quality of play has improved with each game along with the team play!  The Redwoods defense vs Whipsnakes once they settled down was almost as incredible to watch as the Chaos Box-On-The-Field offense once they benched Fields and started sharing the ball.

I'm fired up to see a Chaos win tomorrow!  Head Coach Andy Towers and I were teammates in college and has been a great friend for over 30 years.  I have learned a lot of lacrosse from AT and I'm not surprised he has his team peaking at the right time.  Andy is as competitive as anyone you'll ever know, but has thee gift of making people feel good, want to be around him, and he can do this while sticking to his principles. 

but I'll be sad...

Welcome to "A Lacrosse Weekend" my weekly compilation of thoughts, ideas, stories, myths, truths, about the great game of lacrosse. I hope you enjoy it! 

Premier Lacrosse League

It has been SO GREAT to have PLL on TV every night!  I think I've watched every game and I have some thoughts I want to share with you. 

• I'm rooting for the Chaos and Head Coach Andy Towers, but they haven't gotten into synch offensively and are surprisingly struggling at the face off X
• The nice thing about this tournament is all you have to do is get hot at the right time! 
• The Whipsnakes look better than ever with the addition of Zed Williams.
• Kyle Bernlohr and Blaze Riorden have been insane!  Wow!
• Refs are letting too much physicality, slashing, holding and interference occur and I think it hurts the product.  I'd rather see a goal than a hold any day!
• Grant Ament is the real deal in every way!  He's a text book on what I believe in and it's not just his straight speed, it's the way he slows down a
...

Welcome to "A Lacrosse Weekend" my weekly compilation of thoughts, ideas, stories, myths, truths, about the great game of lacrosse. I hope you enjoy it! 

MLL Highlights

This morning I spent four hours  pouring through MLL games looking for interesting clips to write about on this blog.  There are incredible players in this league and I'm so fired up to share some of my findings!

The Victoria Look Back

When I was trying out for the Colorado Mammoth in the fall of 2002 at 35 years old, Gary Gait was on the team and I noticed that every time he caught the ball, he would look at the head of his stick before he would shoot.  I was like, "WTF" is he doing?  Years later I happened to ask the GM at the time, Steve Govett, if he ever noticed and he said, "Oh yeah, that's the Victoria Look Back."  It is an amazing way to freeze a goalie.  Watch the clip below of Ryan Lee and watch the goalie's reaction!

The Victoria Look Back is also an amazing way to freeze a defender!  Here's Matt Rambo...

Welcome to "A Lacrosse Weekend" my weekly compilation of thoughts, ideas, stories, myths, truths, about the great game of lacrosse. I hope you enjoy it! 

COVID-19 Impact on College Lacrosse Recruiting

Months ago I predicted that there would be a major trickle down effect from the extra year of eligibility awarded to every college lacrosse player due to the COVID cancellation of the 2020 lacrosse season.  Sadly, we are now looking at the real threat of losing the 2021 college season.  I don't see Ivy schools competing in 2021 unless the entire student population is back on campus for spring semester, as I don't think the league would make concessions just for athletes to be back on campus.  Patriot League would likely follow suit.  The implications here is that players from these conferences will have two years of eligibility remaining, which could further impact the "Trickle down."

 Here's an update:

• A 5th year transfer feeding frenzy combined with 5th year returning players occu
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Welcome to "A Lacrosse Weekend" my weekly compilation of thoughts, ideas, stories, myths, truths, about the great game of lacrosse. I hope you enjoy it! 

Pandemic's Impact on Recruiting

At the outset of the pandemic, the NCAA enacted a Dead Period for DI coaches which means coaches are not allowed to have on or off campus contact with prospects.  Coaches can't evaluate prospects, can't run or attend camps, and are restricted from meeting with prospects or prospects' families on or off campus.  The Dead Period has been extended to the end of August, which has completely eliminated the summer of 2020 from a "Live" evaluation perspective. 

Film has become critical!  With good quality film and a good camera angle, coaches can actually achieve a more accurate evaluation on film than they could watching live play because they can pause and rewind.  That said, coaches can't feel 100% comfortable with a prospect from film alone because it's impossible to see the speed, quickness, size or co...

Welcome to "A Lacrosse Weekend" my weekly compilation of thoughts, ideas, stories, myths, truths, about the great game of lacrosse. I hope you enjoy it! 

Munro Family RV Trip

On Thursday 5/28 my family and I loaded up the RV and headed east.  We will be spending the month of June in Narragansett, Rhode Island hanging out with family and friends, playing lacrosse, and finally turning the page on the spring that wasn't.  This will be my final installment of this blog until I get back to Denver.

The #1 Rule, No #2

It was a memorable family experience in the RV for a 2000 mile journey to our kids' paradise.  I'm not sure anyone will want to do it again anytime soon, but it was fun nonetheless.  He had some great laughs, fights,  and the dog.... well, he made it.  Our dog is so old, he can hardly walk and is pretty mental.  He finally adjusted and actually laid down after 7 hours of standing.

Lacrosse Game in Every State

One of our goals was to play a 2x game in every state along th...