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!

 Podcast with Colgate's Matt Karweck

Check out my latest Phi-Lacrosse-ophy podcast with Head Coach of Colgate Lacrosse, Matt Karweck.  The 2nd year head coach has an exciting and refreshing vision for the Red Raiders centered on the student athlete experience, helping his players and staff become "Their best selves" and  an up tempo / push transition style of play combined with pressure defense.  I would love to play for this guy!  Click here to enjoy the Matt Karweck Podcast.

Podcast with Arizona State University Head Coach, Tim McCormack

This podcast will drop next week!  Tim is a former 3 year starter for Greg Canella and the UMass Minutemen, who was ready to take the assistant men's position at Holy Cross when UMass legend Scott Hiller called to see if he would have interest in working at...

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

Check out my latest podcast with University of Virginia Offensive Coordinator Sean Kirwan.  Sean is one of the brightest young coaching minds in our sport, he is a tireless worker, endlessly curious, and an all around good guy!  Sean shares his coaching journey, discusses his mentors and what he took from them, and his transition and evolution from coaching at Tufts, to Brown, to UVA.  Sean not only discusses his offensive philosophy and what they did to win this year's championship, but also what he likes about the offenses of Penn State, Yale, and Maryland.  Sean discusses recruiting and his use of analytics wherever possible.  Click here to enjoy the Season Kirwan Podcast!

PLL in Denver

I'm so happy that tonight I get to attend my first Premeir Lacrosse League game at...

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!

Virtual Lacrosse Summit

We just finished another epic Summit with some of the best presentations we've ever had.  Click here to get access to this incredible line up of speakers!

A Summer in Canada

My daughters and I spent the month of June in Niagara on the Lake, (NOTL) Ontario that was truly one of the best experiences a father could ever hope for!  I got to play pick up games with my daughters and their friends pretty much every day! This was the second summer that a couple of my buddies and I rented a house in NOTL so our daughters could play girls box lacrosse in St. Catharines, ON and it was the ultimate opportunity for the kids to get better at lacrosse and have an awesome summer!

I purposely gave the girls their space by going them access to my car and working at my buddy Sean Allen's house during...

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!

Best Fake Ever

My favorite team in the PLL is the Chaos, coached by my good friend and former teammate Andy Towers.  I love the way they play offense combining box players with traditional field players; the insane skill of one handed players combined with hyper athletic, two handed players, all making good decisions and playing unselfishly.  Attackman, Connor Fields is my favorite player in the world right now.  An unselfish X guy, who is an incredible decision maker, Fields uses deception, IQ and repertoire fakes, moves, passes and shots that are mind blowing!

Everyone has probably seen this fake by now.  I have watched it 100 times trying to identify the subtleties of the entire play.  If you listened to the interview, Fields noted that he had hurled a BTB shot at...

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!

Summer Recruiting Sanity

Like many parents around the country this weekend, I'm at a summer recruiting tournament with my aspiring college lacrosse player!  It's early in the summer recruiting and with the heightened excitement to play travel lacrosse with friends and against new competition, staying in team hotels and fun Friday night dinners also comes stress.  Stress can hit even the best of us who are trying to keep everything in perspective and can ruin the weekend for everyone involved!  The key to enjoying the weekend is to set proper expectations.  Here are a few:

• When your son or daughter was born, you weren't thinking about college lacrosse.  You hoped they would grow up happy and healthy, to learn life lessons through successes and failures and someday go to college.  Our kids are...

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!

Memorial Day Weekend might be my favorite weekend of the year!  Graduation parties, barbecues, family and of course, Championship Weekend!  I hope you are enjoying it as much as I am!

Summer Recruiting

As spring high school lacrosse transitions to summer recruiting, please remember this: If you are not good enough, there is nothing to talk about!  Ask yourself, "How is my son or daughter going to get better this summer?"  If your answer is, "he/she is playing a ton of tourneys," you are hitting the nail right on the side!   

I encourage all parents to actually count how many touches your kid gets in a game.  How many dodges, how many shots, how many times was he/she dodged against.  You will be shocked, dismayed, and depressed over how few touches players actually get 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!

NCAA Men's Lacrosse Tournament

2019 has been the year of the attackman.  Today's quarterfinals will highlight several of the greatest college attackmen we have ever seen!

• Penn State's Grant Ament, who set the NCAA single season assist record, has phenomenal speed and vision, but who can physically post up his man even though he's not a big man.
• Loyola's Pat Spencer is a generational talent who's feeding prowess combined with his physical gifts is unparalleled.  This guy has a repertoire of moves and fakes that keeps defenders off balance while he manipulates off ball defenders and sliders.
• Maryland's Jared Bernhart, an insane slasher who can do it all.  This Terp is as fine of an athlete as you'll see at the attack position and is incredibly two handed with great vision and IQ.
• Virginia has a deadly...

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!

NCAA Men's First Round Weekend

This is my favorite weekend of lacrosse all year!  Eight games in two days, incredible quality of play, upset bids, one goal and O.T. games!  It doesn't get any better than this! Here are some quick thoughts about all the games.

Loyola vs Syracuse

The Pat Spencer show will be on full display with partner in crime Kevin Lindley , who is probably the best off ball crease guy in Division I lacrosse.  Together they create a one, two punch that puts the defense in a tough spot.  If you can't stop Spencer 1v1 you will pay the price sliding from Lindley.  And if your game plan is to slide from someone other than Lindley, Loyola will make you pay with their spacing and positioning of Lindley.  It's easier said than done.  Last week Army had success...

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!

College Lacrosse Recruiting

The topic this week is "getting looks" versus "getting better."  From my experience, most families get caught up in getting looks at the expense of getting better.  The summer is no exception to this constant improvement paradigm, in fact it is a huge opportunity.  College coaches will watch a prospect play live multiple times in order to make a decision on their ability.  If a coach notices improvement over the course of the summer it is impactful.

The best Division I Lacrosse programs employ the same model of consistent individual skill development during the season with the thought the best way to make your team better is to make your players better.  Duke, Denver, Yale are great examples programs where the players seem to add to their repertoire of moves, shots,...

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!

How To Be A Great Shooter

If you want to learn how to be a great shooter, listen to the Darris Kilgour Podcast from a few months back.  Darris is hands down one of the smartest lacrosse minds I've ever met.  A Native American who grew up on the Tuscarora Reservation just outside of Buffalo, Darris grew up playing backyard lacrosse at home and box lacrosse just over the boarder in Ontario.  

One of Darris's most brilliant concepts is the idea of learning how to be a deceptive shooter by shooting on a goalie with no ball.  Does this sound crazy?  I've tried it and found this method of teaching deceptive shooting extremely effective because scoring as your measure for a good shot is removed from the equation.  The entire goal is to score the "Air Ball" by moving the goalie or...