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

College lacrosse season is now in full swing and I find myself writing to you from the Holiday Inn Express in Eugene, OR. We are here to watch our daughter and the Ducks take on Mercer. I don't think anyone else besides my wife and I can claim to have seen Mercer's men's and women's team in their respective openers! On the other coast our son and the Tarheels take on Furman. At least we live in the middle! It's going to really heat up in our household when HS lacrosse starts as I'm coaching my youngest daughter's team, which I'm so fired up for!

JM3 Road Trip Videos

This week I did a couple Facebook Lives where I shared a bunch of behind the scenes video, photos and stories from the greatest lacrosse trip ever! My RV crew and I are rooting hard for the teams we visited and so far so good! Congrats to High Point and Colgate on their respective wins this week!

 Phi-Lacrosse-ophy Podcasts

Greg Gurenlian: the legendary face-off man, has revolutionized the face-off by using his background and education in Strength & Conditioning to leverage biomechanics into his game, his coaching, and his flourishing business, the Face-off Academy. This guy is incredibly smart, experienced, well spoken and passionate. We discuss his lacrosse journey, the greatest FOGO's ever, and his excitement about the PLL. Great listen! Greg Gurenlian Podcast

Andy Towers: PLL Head coach and former DI coach, Towers was a player like none other. What I mean is he had Hall of Fame ability in both face offs AND as an offensive player. Imagine Trevor Baptiste with over 200 points in his career. That was Towers. Now, Andrew and I are going to do a weekly podcast called "In Season" that will talk about college lacrosse match ups, players, and story lines. There will be a fair amount of humorous banter as well as high level lacrosse analysis. Here's the link: Andy Towers Podcast

High Point

How about the HUGE dub from the Jon Torpey led High Point team versus #2 Duke on Wednesday night! I can't say I'm surprised! Having spent an entire day with the program and the staff, it was obvious that they have a great thing going and the talent to back it up. Coach Torpey is cutting edge in everything he does: X's and O's, skill development, the use of technology, leadership and team development. Practices are fast paced and most everything is competitive! There is always a winner and a loser. The winning team celebrates and the losers run. Simple! Why don't we all do this? The environment teaches teamwork all the while. I watched one team win in the "Downhill Drill" (watch RV video part 2) and all the guys ran on the field to celebrate the victory. Then I heard Torp yell, "No goal! No Point!" You see, the goal scorer failed to point at the assist man after the goal, which is a Panther rule. The other team got possession of the ball, transitioned, scored and pointed! Game over.

Up the Middle

A recipe for success in the sport of lacrosse is having great goaltending, face-offs, and a "sick" attackman. Look what it did for the 2016 Brown Bears! High Point's win over Duke exemplifies this point. Goalie, Tim Troutner: Torp told me during our visit he thought this kid was the best in the nation. He had 19 saves vs Duke. In this new shot clock era, which is an advantage for the defense, save percentage is going to be a huge indicator for winning. Face offs: just the season before last, HPU was abysmal at the X! They won something like 33%! Coach Kenny Broschart has turned this unit around and if the 14/27 effort versus Duke is an indicator of high level ability to compete, Davis Sampere could give the Panthers what they need. The "sick" Attackman, Asher Nolting: This kid is special. I've watched him grow up over the years as he's a Colorado kid. He was always very good and then his senior year things came together for him physically and he has never looked back. Nolting is a premier attackman in the nation similar to Pat Spencer in his ability impact dodging, feeding, scoring, and quarterbacking.

RV Magic?

Colgate

Another huge win and upset was last night with the Red Raider's 12-9 win over Syracuse! Congrats to first year head coach Matt Karweck and staff! This is another program we visited on our RV trip and, again, I can't say I'm surprised by the result. My RV crew and I sat with coach Karweck, Coach Crawley, and Coach Cooper for four hours watching film of their Delaware scrimmage, talking X's and O's and the whiteboard, and talking skill development with classic "In office demos," as well as watching a practice. It was obvious that Colgate has talent. They have weapons on offense, athletes and size on defense, and last night they won face offs and made saves (up the middle again!). With a new staff, a fresh start, and the cupboards left pretty full, Colgate who was picked only middle of the pack in the Patriot League will be a team to be reckoned with.

Could there be an RV Effect?

Northwestern

Coach Amonte-Hiller's gang cruised to a 19-5 2nd half lead and an eventual 21-11 over Louisville last night. I didn't get to watch the game, but I will. I love the way the Wildcats play offense with their box lacrosse style of play: 2man side, 3 man side, and 2 behind. Picks, slips, seals, mirrors, nations looks combined with athletes and skill. As I've mentioned before, Selena Lasota is off the charts!  Northwestern is going to score goals! If they can build on this great defensive effort, they're going to be in good shape in 2019!

Another big RV win!

JM3 Athletes

I work with a small and select group of boys and girls athletes from across the nation in a really cool model of remote coaching and consultation. Utilizing the JM3 Academy www.JM3Academy.thinkific.com for an instructional plan, the video assessments tool, www.JM3Video.com for evaluation, weekly video conference calls with the athletes, and consultation with families, my goal is to help give motivated athletes their best chance to reach their lacrosse and academic goals. I limit the total number of athletes I work with to 12 and I currently have 2 slots open. The impact in player development, advocacy, advice, and networking is real and the results so far have been staggering. If you're interested in this program you must apply by Clicking Here and being assessed, then we can do a follow up to see if your son/daughter are the right fit for this program. I will supply references of current and former clients when the time comes and will require the same from you. You can also email me with further questions.

Enjoy the Weekend!