S1 E32. Andy Towers, David Evans, & USILA Player of the Year Darren Lowe, Recruiting Compilation, Part II

It is college lacrosse recruiting season! So many questions arise when facing this daunting time of year.  When should you first contact a DI, DII, or DIII coach? When should you send your introductory email and what should you say or not say? How do you put together your fist highlight tape and what do you include? Should parents get involved? If so, when and to what degree? Rest assured, we’ve got ALL the answers you need! 

We have put together a compilation of our interview with top college lacrosse recruiting consultants Andy Towers & David Evans as well Tom & Lynn Dwyer. We have also added the sage advice that came from USILA Player of the Year and two time All Tournament Team selection for Team USA , Darren Lowe along with advice from coaches top DIII coaches such as Dave Webster & Scott Dalgliesh. Listen up and take down some notes as this episode is absolutely jam packed with all sorts of practical information. If you like our content please help the show grow by telling a friend and writing a review!    

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Transcript

Ron: 0:00

it's time for get the La Scoop, a podcast bringing you all the people and stuff you should know. In the game of lacrosse, we take LAX seriously, but ourselves, not so much. Join hosts, big Dog and Jaybird, and the biggest names in the game. Brought to you by Jay McMahon lacrosse. That's J M L Skills, mindset, and LAX IQ training.

Jay: 0:23

Ron Doish, the big dog, was a collegiate football and lacrosse player at Brown. He was also an assistant lacrosse coach and the executive director of the sports found.

Ron: 0:32

and Jay McMahon, the Jaybird, a three time All-American Midfielder Brown. He was a captain of the US Junior National team and is the founder of J M L. And joining us in the studio, Steve gfi, who's collegiate lacrosse career statistics equals one goal against Dartmouth.

0:53

Hello everyone. And welcome back to the show. It is still college lacrosse recruiting season. We've put together another great compilation from our guests. This show has portions of an interview with Lynn Dwyer and her husband, Tom Lynn was a Harvard. Lacrosse national champion. And the two of them have been representing the girls game and women's game in the Philadelphia area for over 20 years. We'll also hear from coach Andrew towers, who many know him as the 2021 PLL champion with the chaos lacrosse club. What many people don't know is that for the past 10 years, he's become one of the most sought after college lacrosse. Recruiting gurus. In the Connecticut area, as he's helped, literally hundreds of boys and girls get into the schools of their dreams. We'll also hear from his counterpart David Evans, who has a very similar expertise as coach towers. Coach Evans is a founding member of the Lac situates lacrosse club, which is part of the national lacrosse Federation. Then we'll hear from Darren Lowe, a former us ILA player of the year and two time, all world team selection for team USA. I normally say, sit back and enjoy. But in this case, I'll say you might want to sit up and take some notes. So you get the most out of this helpful information. We'll start with. Lynn Dwyer. It'll be ladies first. Our interview with lynn and tom in progress

tom: 2:20

You know, there's a long, long chase to this recruiting now, and I don't know, not only have we been through it, but we were involved with running and coaching club lacrosse and I helped place a whole team of, girls Gracie's age.

Jay: 2:35

And now let's, let's just have like a follow up question on that. Would you feel like the way the system is now, having your daughter's been recruited and then as you said, this whole team basically getting recruited, did you feel like they really needed to go to every single one of those events, 12 weeks worth, or have many showcases or would you say, you know what, looking back on it, maybe they could, they could have picked three or four. And so what's your advice on that?

tom: 3:02

Yeah. I mean, going to 12 in the summer, like if you go to like five, six more than that, it seems like the kids get burned out. The teams get burn out. I would you

Jay: 3:13

lean more towards, I myself would recommend three or four, five or six, that kind of thing. Yeah. I

tom: 3:17

would recommend picking your spots and making sure the coaches that you're that you're interested in are at the, you try to focus on the ones where the coaches that you're interested in are at the events. Now do you

Jay: 3:28

know ahead of time where they're gonna be? Or do you send them a message, I'm gonna be here this weekend, or is there any way of getting their schedule? Or is it more,

tom: 3:37

if they're big events, most of the D one and D three, most of them will have someone there. And if you're interested Yeah, you should, I think, the playbook is in advance of the weekend is to say, Hey, I'm gonna be on. This game at this time, and you actually see the coaches walking around at the events and they're, they have their schedule of the players, so you're hoping they, they're intrigued enough to come watch you play. Right. But I think, the other thing, is having advocates, your club coach, your high school coach You gotta rise to the level of getting interest. And then once there's interest that comes see you play, and then your playing the field has to convince them.

Ron: 4:18

Right. So Tom and Lynn, as we as we come towards the end of our time together, I wanna, I wanna summarize some really important points that I think you both have made and, and one of the things Jay and I are trying to do, you know, this game has meant so much to us, and as we see people out there who. Care about the game and are trying to, and who have kids who care about the game. There's so much advice out there, right? And so many people can be in your ear about what you're supposed to do, that we're just trying to provide some common sense guidance. And so, a few things I think that you both have shared. Hey, when your kids are young, let'em play a bunch of sports. They're, they're gonna maintain the joy and love of sport. They're gonna learn from those different sports in ways that are gonna make'em better at whatever their primary sport is. But certainly if you guys said in the sport or lacrosse finding advocates, right? Finding people, whether it's your club coach, your high school coach, or just people in the game who can get you noticed, who can make that first call to a college coach to get you looked at. And then, Fall into the mania of having to go to every single event cuz you're gonna suck the joy out of it for your kids. Are they really gonna play well at 10 events? You know, focus on events where you're gonna go to and you're gonna be seen and you're gonna have fun and just the financial realities around this for certain families. So those are some of the key things I've heard, but I want to give you each one chance. If there's one more piece of advice you'd give, you know, a parent of a 13, 14, 15 year old who's got some ability, who's got some talent, who's got some passion, what would one piece of advice be for each of you as they move through that high school time in terms of trying to get towards the college recruiting endgame?

Lynn: 6:09

I would say you need to this goes back to the beginning of the podcast is you need to focus on both the physical and mental aspects of your sport. And that means, you know, it doesn't mean like necessarily having a sports psychologist or I mean you could, but it means I think having good friendships, seeing what the coaches are like, trying to get along with people. If you can become a leader in your group I think, sort of those intangibles and your skills takes you far.

tom: 6:45

And, I would echo what Lynn says. I mean, we focus a lot with our,, as they get older and, into higher level sports and now they're all look in college or looking to college. We focus a lot on the we talk about the team aspect and being a leader. Which I think goes back to what, you know, we had great coaching with Dom and, you know, 40 some years later, we're still, we're still teammates, and good friends. But I got some really good advice when Lucy, our oldest, was just starting to get into the recruiting window and you're starting to get that parent frenzy in your head. You're like, I gotta do this, I gotta do that. And I talked to my good friend John Beier, who's the high school coach at Radner played at Virginia. And he's just a great guy and he's been through this with so many players over the years. He's on the boys' side, but the same principles apply to boys and girls. And he said, look, the first thing is Lucy's gotta keep her grades up. And I think that applies to any kid like you if you don't keep your grades up at any level, you are. You could just, you could disqualify yourself from going to a school that you want to go to. A coach could see you on the field and be like, wow, you're a terrific player. The first thing they say, if it's a good academic school is send me your transcript. Cuz they want to, once they've interested in you athletically, they wanna see if you're qualified to get in the school. If you're not qualified, forget it. So keep your grades up was the first thing he said With Lucia, that was not a problem for us. Luckily, you know, some of our other kids we have to push a little more. But and then the other thing he said, which I think really applied to Lucia but applies to everybody is keep getting better because, A lot of this recruiting is, it's not a, it's not a one shot deal. They want to see you multiple times. And, you know, unfortunately, I had some players that I coached and they looked great in the fall and then, you know, got a boyfriend, started partying, wasn't working as hard and in the spring they didn't look as good. And, the person I'm thinking about, was tracking to be a get recruited really well at D one and then all of a sudden that wasn't happening anymore. So I think keep getting better keep your grades up and keep getting better. That formula really worked well for our kids and we, you know, we, we kept going back to

Jay: 9:13

that. And now you mentioned keep your grades up, keep getting better. Right. And I would just say, with all parents, naturally when our kids are in school, if they start to fall off, we're usually gonna try to encourage them. And you use the phrase, push them a little bit academically, let's say, and that usually works. You can have a good framework there. What about with lacrosse or hockey? Did you ever push them to practice, push them to work harder or did it come more

Lynn: 9:39

naturally for them? I think we still, even now today, when they're in college, you say keep getting better. If there's, you know, you wanna be on the power play, you wanna do this, you just keep getting better. And I think actually your coach Dom said this, or we have a quote in our house, that consistency is the highest form of mental toughness. So if you can be like Michael Jordan, if you can be consistent, you know, a lot of things go into that, but you. If you're consistent every practice and work hard and try to get better, consistent every game, work hard and try to get better, that that will lead you to being, you know, a great player.

Jay: 10:18

Right. So it sounds like you're encouraging them and having a certain framework, but not necessarily telling them how many hours they need to practice or that sort of

tom: 10:27

thing. Yeah, I mean they, they need to, at some point they need to figure it out themselves and have to have the motivation. But I, I think what, to tie back into your mindset piece at the beginning, you know, look, everybody has issues. You know, you know, we, we, we did some mindset stuff with, with our older daughter cuz she was, you know, she was, she was trying to build her confidence at a certain point. And you know, the interesting thing that, that, that came up when we did that is that. Serena Williams has doubts about herself. Like which you would, you would be like, why, like how Serena Williams, she's the best all time. But, and, and what, what came outta that is that everybody doubts themselves every once in a while. Even you maybe Jay but maybe a little, but the but the, the, the key is that Serena's the best at dealing with it. That she gets herself out of those episodes the quickest and gets to feeling good about herself the quickest. And I think, you know, assessing where you are, we're we, you know, if our kids have issues with anything, with school or whatever, make a plan. And I think when you're saying right, figure it out, make a plan, and, and then, and then do it, is just execute the plan. And that's a great point. And, and, and, and, and back to the whole beginning is this isn't just sports, this is this, this applies to anything you do in life. So, That's great.

Jay: 11:55

And I think so uh, what you said too, just to recognize one of the greatest players of all time in tennis maybe in any sport, Serena Williams, we all have doubts and fears, even her, right? Yeah. So, hey, so it's a matter of being able to deal with them and move on and realizing that that's part of the process. Like, if you have a doubt or field doubt or fear, don't exclude yourself from going forward. Realize this. Everyone has these, how am I gonna deal with it? So it's, it's a skill like everything else.

12:24

And here's three time all american and us ila player of the year and two time all world team selection for team usa darren Lowe.

Darren: 12:35

The other only other place that I really looked at, and considered was Virginia. I went down on a recruiting trip with Jim Str, who was a classmate at Brown, who basically on our trip down there said, go Brown together. They showed me the lawn. I never had a robe. I wasn't gonna go to a bathroom with the shower and the

12:52

Well, but I, we, looked at it and said, there was some scholarship money. Obviously my dad was a teacher and my mom was an an administrative assistant at the time, part-time. And so it was a big stretch for us to go to an Ivy League school without money. And I knew my brother was behind me and my brother's grades were better and his aspirations were Ivy League or, you know, he was going Ivy League. I kinda knew it. Mm-hmm. And so put her parents and, and my parents in a financial. So there was one afternoon where I kind of came to the grips that I was gonna go to Virginia because it was the best thing for us as a family. And it was a sad moment. I was outside shooting hoops and my father leaned out the window right before dinner and said, Hey, come on up here. I walked in the kitchen, he had a yellow legal pad, and he wrote down our family balance sheet and said, this is what I need from you. I'm gonna need you to make this during the summer, and it's gonna go into the pool to pay. These are the loans you're gonna take out to pay for it. We're not gonna give you this and not be able to give your brother an equal opportunity. And you know, so nothing was given in that way. And I think my experience at Brown was all about taking advantage of the people I met. And, you know, when I was there, it wasn't just about the lacrosse. The individuals that, that were there in my first three years in particular showed me a tremendous amount of that leadership. And they're just incredible human beings as well, as well as great lacrosse players that I spent time with. And then as a senior, that leadership boy was gone and Andy Towers had, you know, left school for a year before coming back during that time period. So from a player perspective there was a lot more on my shoulders to to handle and I kind of felt like I was put in a good position by the people before me. So Brown, I always tell people like, I went in there as a kid, I left as what I thought was a man, and I learned a lot that grow further. Right? Well, absolutely. With that senior year that you had Brown, the moral compass that was that was given to me up there was pretty.

Jay: 14:50

That's great. Now just as a follow up, you've remained involved in the game at the highest levels, and what advice would you give a high school sophomore today about the recruiting process and what things they should be doing to help distinguish themselves? Well, I always tell people, the kids here at the Benjamin School down in North Palm Beach, like you walk into a coach and you say, my parents sacrifice. I work hard. That just triggers a few things that'd say I'm going to be a good teammate, right? Because that college coach, their job is on the line with the eight to 10 kids they bring in every year. They have to be good citizens, good players, and they have to produce to keep their job. And so that's one. And then the other pieces too are like continually work on your tr craft, you know, as a, as a sophomore and junior, you know, things speed up, I guess, you know, because of the club circuit. But it's amazing when I was Handling the selection committee for the 2018 games in Israel. One of the things when we picked the team, we asked in the room, how many of you played lacrosse as your only sport growing up? And only one of those 23 guys wow, your hand up. That's amazing. That's just a massive miss because what I learned in the basketball court, you know, create an angle on a fast break, on a bounce, you know, pass with stopping at the foul line is the same in lacrosse as I would've learned on the soccer field. Or my brother would've learned playing quarterback at, you know, the Princeton for a year in the freshman field. You know, those things matter. And I think I also would think that lacrosse players that get recruited, they're usually really, really good. I would like to see kids today do something that they're not really, really, really good at. So they actually have a taste of what it's like to be a member of the team when they're not the star. Right. And I think that's things that I remember Dom recruiting when Dom Starge was a brown. He never saw me play lacrosse in high school until I had actually committed. He only came to watch soccer or basketball games. Hmm. And I think he learned about me as an athlete. So I would say that that's probably something, the advice I would give don't give up on those other sports cause they're their lessons. That's great.

17:08

Next up is david evans and andrew towers and joy

Dave: 17:13

If you're throwing a broad net, you're gonna catch a minnow. you gotta throw that lo in, catch a tuna, and, like at what age would you say they gotta start honing it down and saying, all right, and how would this, we want to tie this into the recruiting process, right? Like you're saying your daughter here, eighth grader, they're telling her, what? Ninth grade comes, you really can't play soccer and all these other sports, you gotta just pick soccer. I know lacrosse doesn't do that. I don't think basketball does that. But for these lacrosse people who are listening, give us an idea the age and then how this leads into the recruiting process. If you could, what is your expectation straight up? What's your expectation in terms of let's say someone wants to go division one and lacrosse, or one, two, or three. Let's just say, let's start with division. I, I mean that, that's a beautiful point though. One three, there's a massive overflow. Like your SCAs, your top 20 D three schools are very, very good, very good. You're gonna struggle to get on the field as a freshman, unless you're totally committed and you're a beast. Now, with that said, like if like your expectation is to play division one lacrosse, and you might need a scholarship. Okay? Like, you need to examine that, right? Like, if you are, I, like I, I don't know, like I, I almost feel like I'm in this political spectrum now, but if you have an expectation, like my mom, my dad played Ivy League lacrosse, I need to play Ivy League lacrosse, then buddy, get on your horse days, period, and you need to play every day. And that, if that's your expectation. So, it just really depends. Like if you want to go to college and play a sport and you want to dabble in your, your like town high school programs and you're spirited all those things, that's great. I love that, all that. But you have to manage your expectation, right? Because if you have these expectations that are super high, right? And you fall short of one, you fall short of the next, you fall short of the next, it, it doesn't work that way. You need to set a goal specific to what you want to do as, as a player. And by the way, we're talking about the kids, right? We're not talking about the bumper sticker. All right? We're not talking about what you want for the water cooler or the cocktail party. We're talking about your child. What's the best move for them? Right, right. And it might not always jive. All right? And that's a tough conversation. Parents, they probably already turned us off. Podcast got deleted, whatever. But it is real, it is a reality because it might not always jive. And the rose colored glasses are real and dealing with club players day in and day out, and parents. And at the end of the day, I say like, if, if you're watching your son, you're watching film, you're a defenseman. If you get beat and you're a defenseman, you're gonna have problems. You're gonna have problems get recruited. If you're a FO and you're under 40% Andy's, stud, foggo coach, et cetera, you're under 40, 50% trouble. You're an attack man and you can't beat your man. You're, I'm a feeder bullshit Okay. If you're a defender, I'm sorry if you're a mid. Okay. And this is, I'm a little bit in the middle of this one. Like, you can be a, a stud DMed and be a huge resource for a coach. Mm-hmm. But you better never get beat. Okay. If you're a midfielder offensively. Right. What are your points? Like you have to score, you have to score a period righty, lefty, all those things. Right? So looking at it, black and white, that's, I want, I wanna, I wanna say one more thing. Yeah. This is very important to me. Kids need to play righty and lefty. Okay. And I love my boys from up north, but we are you as a lacrosse. All right? We're not backhanded, shovel passing. We are two hands split. Either way. Diverse, play any position. Let's get back to that guy. Right? Let's get back to the guy that can do everything. Shoot righty, lefty. Okay. I shot 109. Right-handed, I shot a hundred left-handed. Wow. Because that's what Skip told me to do. That's awesome. Yeah. I remember when I was in high school, Andy Krauss was the year ahead of me and we had a fastest shot and he stepped up and he shot, maybe 90 or something with it. He was lefthanded and then he put the stick in his right hand, and this is senior year in high school, or maybe even junior year, and he shot at like 88 with his offhand. So yeah, that's, you took it up a notch. D but that, that's awesome. But, but look in your, in your respect with you, that was probably with an SL two or Sam. Right? Right. Okay. But that totally motivated me seeing that. I'm like, I've gotta be able to do that if I wanted to be as good as this guy, So, yeah. I like it. I love it. Now, Andy, with both boys and girls, with travel, lacrosse, everybody's playing a lot of games and sometimes I feel like the players, I've coached a lot of players too over the years. I feel like they get this mentality of like, well, I'm playing so many games and I go to practice. I don't need to practice on my own. Like, they don't even take the time. And I try to explain to them, if you're going to these games and even at practice, we don't have a lot of time to fix your form, and you just keep shooting with the wrong form, you're not gonna be hitting the cage. So what would be your advice for kids as far as, you've been an extremely successful skills trainer. I know as David just said, with his program, that's part of the routine at Massachusetts. What is your advice to our audience, parents, boys, girls out there as far as putting time into the skills? You said how David used to his dad, skip, would have him out there shooting X number of shots. Like what's a legitimate routine for these kids and and what do you think they need to put into that, their individual skills? Yeah. I talk, when I talk about how these kids are evaluated, whether it's being evaluated town people that are choosing the A team versus the B team, whether it's, high school coaches who's gonna make the varsity and who's not, whether it's college recruiters these guys are really being Eva, these players are really evaluated in four ways, right? They're evaluated from an athletic standpoint. Are they athletic enough to win the situation? Can the coach trust that? Are they skilled enough to win or are they skilled enough to execute their respective decisions with consistency? Getting back to what David just said, like everything that we do in our program, we're doing righty and Lefty every single time. We're doing it off at three levels of pressure. So you can not only have to throw righty and Lefty, you have to be able to throw off of the splits, off of the roles and, and sidearm push passes and sidearm pull passes, right? And so having that skillset, which is stick work, stick handling, ground ball play and shooting, those are all things that you can work on your own, right? And so anybody that isn't consistently, and David said you gotta touch it every day, and I agree a hundred percent. You've gotta love the work. we talked a few minutes ago about, guys at work after practice and how much. we would stay after practice, do one-on-ones and all that sort of stuff. Like, you've gotta love the work, otherwise you're simply gonna you're gonna lose to the people that do love the work. And there's enough people that love the work that you're gonna be shit outta luck if you don't love the work and, and, and are willing to do it all the time. athleticism, skillset. The next one is iq. IQ is simply knowing what to do based on what the situation is and based on your respective role within that situation. Right? Are you on defense? If you are, are you on ball you off ball? Is it settled or unsettled if you're on offense? Or do you have the ball or are you off ball?

25:24

We're in transition to, uh, JML and let's do that. Today's JML minute. Is inspired by what both of our guests have said. They have discussed the skill level being at an elite level. And they've also discussed how many of these players are starting their own academies that are all in person. Now if you are not proximal to those locations, if you cannot get to them. That's where the J McMahon lacrosse app comes into play. It is something that your son or daughter can use. Wherever they are. All over the country. It's an app that they would download on their phone. And then the training is right there at their fingertips. Many of our prior guests all being college lacrosse coaches Said that players need to develop a skill or ability that just pops on the field. That is, they need to develop their game. I asked you, what is your game? Acquiring skills that you need starts by working on your own in your backyard or at a local field. And while you're doing that, you want to have the benefit of the technology that we're talking about. So using technology to accelerate your path to improvement. Now the Jim McMahon lacrosse app is designed to help you do just that. On the app, we have a free mini course. On three types of shooting, which are stepped down shots or outside shots shooting on the run and shooting from the crease. Along with the instructional videos on this free course, we have drills that you can use to perfect these skills. And when you're ready, you can move on to our paid programming. We have the go from good to great course. Six week journey that has all the skills, lacks, IQ and mindset information that I've learned from playing under great coaches like Dom stars. Yah. And playing with great players like Andy towers and coach large, Tiffany. On top of all that I've been coaching with lacrosse for over 20 years and have put all that knowledge onto the app. Now. The course has six weekly sections each section is 30 to 40 minutes long. And you follow the 10 minute videos so you'd get, say three or four, 10 minute videos per week. And then the drills you'd follow up with that and look to perfect. The skills. And I know from a fact having had many other players use this training course itself can absolutely transform your game. So go ahead and download. The J McMahon lacrosse app on the apple app store. Or if you have an Android phone at the Google play. Uh, app section. That you would simply type in J a Y M C M a H O N. Lacrosse. And download it. And as, our guests, had said. Skills mindset and lax iq are really exponentially growing in the game of lacrosse and that's what this app is designed to help you do now we will return to our interview in progress

Dave: 28:30

Is it settled or unsettled? And having an awareness of, of how to play the situation the right way, regardless of what your role is. And, and those are things that you really can only develop when you're working in group situations. you can certainly watch film and watch games, and I encourage all these kids to watch. D one games and watch college games and watch, the pll and all this sort of stuff because you, you can certainly become a smarter player by watching the best players play. But again, those are things that you could only do in a group. And then the last thing that these guys are evaluated in, and, and this is what I think is perhaps the most important one are a player's intangibles, right? And a and a player's intangibles are the things that you decide about yourself that you want other people to see in you and say about you, right? And all of these things are a choice. None of'em are a limitation, right? You want people to say you're hyper-competitive. That's a choice. You can either decide that you're not gonna fucking lose, or you can decide that you're good with it, right? You can decide whether you're. right? You can either listen to the coach's message or you can get wrapped up into packaging and say, you doesn't like me. Shut the

29:40

Beep

Dave: 29:40

up. He doesn't like

29:42

Beep

Dave: 29:43

that's what he doesn't like, right? Mm-hmm. uh, Are you authentically team first, regardless of what your role is on game day? There's a million people that we've played with and over the years that are as gungho and out for the team success as long as there's playing on the first midfield and the start and the center of the three three. But as soon as they get beat out by somebody that maybe they don't even think that person is better than them, all of a sudden they start to the coach and, and talk a, basically become a team cancer. being mentally tough, as I said before hearing the message, not the packaging being physically durable. This is a huge one for me, right? You either wanna play or you don't wanna play, and the amount of kids that, don't practice or don't go to games or, or sit out because they're hurt. when you just don't have a lot of opportunities. You're either finding a way to play or you're finding a way to not play. Mm-hmm. And I think physical durability is also a decision. I'm not talking about people that, you have a snapped femur will suck it up. Andy. that's a unique situation that's, obviously you can't play in that situation, but aches and pains, so much of sports is being able to manage that. The guys that manage the pain the most are usually the ones that end up winning the most often. Right. And I think that those four things, athleticism, skillset, IQ, and intangibles make up a player. And I think that you can control three of'em, right? You're your athleticism. Yeah. You can enhance it a little bit with strength condition, but you kind of are what you are. Mm-hmm. Right? Mm-hmm. but you directly control your skillset. And so when you've got kids that aren't skilled and they're making the same stick mistakes over and over, over again, that's a kid that doesn't love the work, otherwise he would fix those things. Right? Right. If you're making the same decisions that are not correct, you're either dumb as a sack of hammers or you're not coachable Right, right. You're just, you're just refusing to listen to, your coaches and, and the other players that you play with. And then the last part is you've got a shitty attitude and you're not disciplined and you're not willing to push through discomfort, play through pain, and be mentally tough and be hyper-competitive and be authentically out for your teammate's success. It's one of the things that David was so good at, and you two were Jay, and I think the best teams have that as a characteristic of the culture, right? Right. Guys that play and embrace and are stewards to their teammates, successes. those are all the things that go into to develop in yourself as a player. And having an awareness that those variables exist. Is the key to being able to check those things off. as reasons why you won't be successful. And if you do that, you got a good chance. And if you aren't successful and you do all those things, then who the fuck cares? Because you can't do anything more than doing everything you can proactively to get the desired result. Right. And if you don't get it and go down swinging and that is success. Right. And I would say it's the same exact thing for college players gonna be pros or a kid going from the JV to the varsity. I feel like it's those the same tents you just said. It's the same exact stuff at every level. It's just doing it better and better. I think it's the same thing when you're prepare to take a test in school. When you're chasing the girl you want to date, when you're trying to get a promotion at work, none of it is dead. It's all the same thing. Right? Right. The guys that are proactive love the work and are disciplined and can do it when they don't feel like doing what I say all the time. Everything that we do in my program is competitively based. And if you win, you get two minutes of water and if you lose, you get two minutes of planks, no water, and if your knees hit during the planks, then you're out of the rest of the session. And I've got third grade girls that can do planks. Like you cannot believe because they don't wanna miss out on the session. Right. And they learn to adapt. I tell'em all the time, if there was a big basket of snakes right there, you could do a plank for 10 minutes. So tell me you can't do it for two minutes. It's a decision. Right, right. And, and, and if people make the decisions to check all the boxes that are effort, toughness, and competitive spirit related, they're gonna get a ton of success in their lives. Right.

Ron: 33:46

Beautiful. Beautiful. So Dave and Andy, we're gonna end with two speed round answers. So yes, we are asking you to shorten your answers. 1111,

Dave: 33:56

these answers. Okay. Cause I gotta, I gotta go anyway. I wanna lift weights. Yeah. All right.

Ron: 34:01

still competing, David. All right. Hey look, I'm gonna get the car

Dave: 34:04

and flirt into a telephone pole. Let's let's, let's

Ron: 34:08

get very specific here in terms of your advice. Okay? You guys both. Know this inside and out. And when we talk about the college recruiting process, let's say we've got a sophomore high school sophomore, okay? Let's say they love the work. 2025. Yep. A 2025. They love the work. Okay. And they're just now starting to, to, to think about how they can get noticed. And

Dave: 34:34

this is the fall, Ron, is it the fall or what time of year? You, you guys tell us In this sophomore year. Go ahead. Sorry.

Ron: 34:39

I thought I was asking the question. I

Dave: 34:41

wanna make sure you're sophomore doing it. Jesus. The right way. Ron. Once, right? For our people. Please.

Ron: 34:47

Once in All American. Always in All American. He just can't, let me ask the question. Just do it. Pray. Good Lord. Okay, Jay. It's the fall of my sophomore year. We'll be Thank you. Be even more specific. What, where do they start? What, what are the three things you gotta do as a high school sophomore in the fall to start your process? College recruiting. Andy, you go first. What are my three things I'm gonna do?

Dave: 35:14

Get better, get better, get better. That's what that, those will be all three things, all the same thing. Work on becoming a better athlete. Work on becoming more skilled. Work on developing a greater iq and work on being aware that you're constantly developing your intangibles. Everybody's making a decision on you with everything that you do in and out of the classroom, on and off the field, in and out of the community. Great. David? Weight room. If you're not in a program, you better get in a badass program quick. Someone checking your percentages, increasing every week. Andy said, get better. Like, he hit that. Okay. So I'm like, you gotta be big, tough, strong. You gotta be playing. And, and then I also think that You have to like, set certain goals, like for what you want to do. It's a big, it's a big picture type thing. Depending on where you start and, if you're starting from square one, like you haven't, meaning you haven't been in the weight room yet, like it's gonna be an up uphill climb, right? If you're, if you're there and you're in the thick of it, okay, then like, like Andy said, you need to put yourself against the right competition. Find the right competition, which probably means playing for like a pretty good program that plays against the right competition in that top tier. Mm-hmm. there's a lot that aren't playing in that group. And then if you can, you will get noticed and you got also regionally depending where you are, like, I don't love prospect days. All right. I don't love them. But depending on your region, you might need them. They might be a necessity and you might need to attend certain ones. Find those prospect days that will ab pit you up against the top talent in the country. It's generally gonna be a private prospect day, not a university school run. I'm sorry for all the college coaches out there, but they can't regulate the talent coming in. It's an N C A violation. They open it up, 40 spots, 50 spots, boom. They're filled. That's it. Okay. It's not their fault. All right. So how do you find these other prospect days? The private ones, they're done by the clubs or who doing things? I'm, yeah, they're all over. I'm not even gonna go there cause I don't wanna like pump someone's tires without like, actually they could Google that basically. No, I agree. You don't want, you can, you can also talk, if you talk to a coach who's, I'd I'd say like pretty, pretty astute in the process. They're gonna know the right ones to go to and attend. They're gonna need to get you in cuz most of'em are invite, most of the top ones invite only. But if you do a little scratching. you can figure that out. Lord knows, like most of these parents players are very resourceful. They'll figure that out, so. Right. Okay.

Ron: 38:02

Good. Very good. So a couple, couple of takeaways there. So many people spend so much time on the process and trying to figure out the recruiting process, and they're spending way more time on that than they are actually getting better. And so what I hear from both of you, if you're good enough, if you work hard enough, the process will take care of itself

Dave: 38:23

significantly. And then, and I was throwing there too, you guys are doing a great job of saying, how do I know I'm better? You're beating your guy consistently. Yeah. You're winning more than 50% of your face offs. When you shoot 10 shots. Six of them go in, right? You gotta look at this black and white, right? I.

Ron: 38:40

Beautiful

38:41

Next up coach webster from dickinson and coach douglas from rpi discuss some of the timing differences in some of the different do's and don'ts when it comes to division three recruiting versus division one

Ron Dawg: 38:54

So guys, now it's time for, our speed round. Okay. And Jay and I have a series of questions that are about continuing to help our listeners learn more about the lacrosse process. But unlike my style,, we're trying to keep this short and succinct. Okay? Right? We're trying to give'em the, just, just the facts, ma'am, here, it's interesting, Jay, that you have him run this segment, right? You know? Well, I'm gotta jump in too. Uh, yes, Jay, we'll, we'll allow Jay to participate in this segment as well, but I will begin. Okay, go around. So, Dave, we'll start with you and then Scott, you answer this one. Secondly, at what stage in a high school career should a student athlete be reaching out to you to express interest and how should they reach out? And what do you wanna know when you're just getting, when a kid's just getting started in the process? We're hearing now from, from, uh, young guys who've just finished their 10th grade and, and so they're sending us kind of some films, some basic academic information and expressing kind of that they're beginning this process and we're one of the schools they're interested in. And, and we're, we're not doing a ton with that right now as we're wrapping up the, the other classes, but I would say that's an appropriate age to, for division three to first reach out. Scott, I.

Scott: 40:15

Yeah, I would second that. It's, it's very similar for us. Um, uh, you know, I'll add that I, I love the I M L C A, uh, sports recruit, um mm-hmm. You know, website that, that these young men can have profiles on. And, and those are tremendously helpful.'cause they, they tell you where he is playing, you know, they post their film up there, you know, they've got their, their high school and their club information, you know, they've got their academics. That's really the foundation. You know, we, we need to know if they fit the academic buffet bucket, do they fit, uh, fit in the, uh, in the athletic bucket. And, and then those are the two things that are gonna lead to ultimately then us, you know, talking to'em at another lever and figure it out if they're really a fit for our programs.

Ron: 40:53

How about any mistakes that kids make in that initial outreach?

Dave: 40:56

we all get, you know, the mass emails that they send to, the 50 colleges and that's fine, but when they, when. Put one to me that's addressed to a different coach at a different college. Just some, some of the attention to details. Important. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That might not go over so well, coaching the initial outreach, but really connecting with that. I don't, yeah.

Scott: 41:17

I don't love when I get emails from a young man saying I'm really interested in r i t as opposed to r p I, that, that doesn't exactly sit very well with me.

Dave: 41:27

It also concerns us when we, when we hear from the parents initially, um, I, I think that communication should be led by the, the, the young guys. The parents certainly have a role. Um, and, and, but it shouldn't be initially,

Scott: 41:43

A hundred percent. I couldn't agree with that more. I'm always very just confused when a parent makes the initial outreach, you know, this is that young man's process. Yeah. We're, we're gonna recruit the family.

Dave: 41:55

Right., and the parent should absolutely be involved, but, it should be the young man taking the lead. Mm-hmm. Now would, let's say highlight

Jay: 42:03

tape game tape, game tape, neither or both. And then what do you want and what do you look for? And then we could start with Coach Dave first with that. Should that be in that initial email, exchange?

Dave: 42:17

Sure. And again, the young guys are probably just getting some, some tape for the first time. So if they don't, it doesn't exclude them from the process. I don't have time to watch game tape and try to find them. So the highlights, are helpful and we know what we're looking at highlights, so we, we get that. But just a couple minute quick clip, just again, so we can just see kind of the athlete, the skillset, knowing that they're in 10th grade and it's gonna change a lot, but we want to have a foundation to work with. I. Mm-hmm.

Scott: 42:47

Yeah, absolutely. And, uh, highlights all the way, again, it doesn't preclude you from the process, but it is certainly helpful the more times and the more settings, we, we can evaluate, um, you know, the, the clearer the picture becomes.

Dave: 43:01

Right? Um, and, and I think really important for, you know, your listeners, that we don't need the slow-mo, we don't need the flashy, you know, uh, you know, graphics and like that stuff does not matter. Um, you know, it's, it's your play, right? Um, so save yourself the money. Um, and, and, uh, just, just keep it simple. Put your best players at the front, put a variety in there and, that'll give us a great foundation to kick things off with. And, and, and that's a little thing, but I'll, I'll tell you just recently we've gotten some film with. Music and, and really questionable lyrics with the music. Mm-hmm. And, and it seems like a little thing, but I wrote back to both of those young men and just suggested to them that they should think through that.'cause some could be offended and just kind of question some things. So again, attention to detail and, and putting your best foot forward matters. Absolutely. Yeah.

Ron: 43:58

So, Scott, how about if you take this one, uh, role of club and high school coach in the process and how kids should be encouraging those folks to reach out?

Scott: 44:09

Yeah, definitely important. Um, you know, uh, a lot of these high school and club coaches have been around for a while. They've got a lot of relationships with college coaches and, and experience with the different institutions. Um, and, and they know those young men, and so they can be great on a recommendation side of things for, for us as college coaches, sort of on the front end. Um, and, and they can be great on the back end. Um, you know, I'm, I'm always surprised that, uh, I talked to a high school coach, um, you know, a few days ago just getting ready to offer a young man and, and so, uh, reached out and, you know, I just said, coach, I really appreciate you calling. There's, there's so many guys that don't call and, and ask our opinion, uh, as a high school coach. And, and that always just baffles me because those are the guys that, that spend. A lot of time with him. And in this instance it was a, you know, a boarding school. So this coach sees him in all kinds of setting, right? He, he knows how he, that young man conducts himself on a, on a daily basis. And for me, I, you know, I always think we're, we're gonna spend a lot of time together in four years. Mm-hmm. Um, I, I wanna make sure that, uh, I can do all the homework I possibly can, uh, to make sure that that young man is a right fit and that there's no, no question marks. Um, so, uh, yeah, they're, they're definitely a, a a piece of the puzzle, in this process for sure.

Dave: 45:30

I would add, real quickly, my brother's a long time high school coach at Pingry School in New Jersey. Real successful program. Oh, yeah. Mm-hmm. And he's always amazed by how few college coaches connect with him. Oh, wow. And just go to the club coaches and, and my brother Michael is with these young men in the classroom, in the hallways and over four years and really knows them and their character. And, and that's certainly important to us coaches when we make that investment.

Jay: 45:57

Right? Absolutely. Now, what is the biggest way parents can help and hurt their child in the recruiting process? Scott, what do you say?

Scott: 46:10

Empower them to take ownership of their own process. I was on a Zoom call recently, and I could see that the parents were trying to empower'em. I said, Hey, look,, I really appreciate that you're trying to do that. Um, but it's also an opportunity for you to, ask questions. You know, parents have experience, right? And they have knowledge that, young men can't have. And so, I think asking questions is a great way to be helpful in the process.

Dave: 46:32

Yeah, my daughter,, was a division one soccer recruit, and so we went through this process on a different perspective for me now as the parent just a couple years ago., and so I, I learned a lot through that and very interesting. And of course my daughter didn't,, think I had anything to add to this whole experience.

Ron: 46:49

No. You, you don't know anything about the process coach. Nothing. No,

Dave: 46:53

but I think you take, just as Scott suggested, you're kind of guiding and you're helping, but kind of in a silent way and allowing things. And where, where we really get involved as parents is at, you know, at the kitchen table after the visit and before the phone calls and just helping that along.

Ron: 47:10

So guys, I know one thing that's often vexing for players is, uh, you know, recruits is I don't really know where I stand. And so give us, the right kind of question to ask a coach that has them tell you where you stand at a point in the process. Webby.

Dave: 47:28

Yeah. So we try to be, as I suggested, real transparent upfront and we talk about kind of our goals for the class and the number of guys and by position and et cetera.

Ron: 47:37

We, we try to let the young man know where they are in that mix and that's gonna change and be very dynamic throughout the process. And, and we ask the same of them to be, you know, transparent with us. But, but the simple question we're getting a lot of that right now is coach where, where, where do I stand? Are you still recruiting me? Um, uh, for, for certain positions, fog's, goalies, where we tend to bring in one for, for a class, uh, they certainly want to know where they are. And, and at times we, we don't, we, you know, as it's going through earlier in the summer, we, we've got a mix of players for those spots and then we start to develop kind of a more of an order to it, and we can share that as we go through. But asking questions, being real direct with coaches, being real proactive with that is certainly, encouraged and helpful.

Scott: 48:27

Yeah, that's it. A hundred percent. You know, what coach, what do you see as my role and where do I stand? And if you're not really sure, as, you know, WEBY mentioned, I mean, it's all, it's so dynamic and it changes, you know, it can say changing an instant, right. Young man makes a decision one way or the other. So yeah, what's my role? Where do I stand? And if you don't know where I stand right now, when will you, right. Just be direct and I operate, we operate the same way as we try to be as transparent as possible in the process. Mm-hmm.

Ron: 48:52

I also hear in that guys that I think, you know, people don't appreciate that it's a process for you guys too. And sometimes I, I find kids overreacting early in the process to a sense, like, the coach won't tell me while I'm like, The coach may not know yet. Like you gotta stay in the mix. They're talking to a lot of kids. Keep fighting, keep scrapping, keep playing. So I think you know it, it works both ways, right? So, so telling the kids to stay with the process until the coach says, nah, uh, you know, I'm sorry, we got someone we like better than you. Absolutely. Yep.

Jay: 49:25

Okay. And now what is the general timeline of the recruiting process in D three and for you guys at Dickinson and R P I in terms of when you're getting the student athletes to come and visit the campus, and then when you're making offers and seeking those commitments?

Ron: 49:43

Yeah. Uh, from, from our perspective, uh, with the Division one rules changing a, a couple of years ago, um, and, and not being able to visit until the fall of your junior year, we're, we're pretty well on that same timeline, um, you know, uh, a little later than the division one, but there are certainly some that, that we start going after aggressively in the fall and, and, you know, in some instances begin to make offers. So, it's not too dissimilar at the end of the day. You know, most of it happens coming out of that junior year into the junior year this summer right now, as they're transitioning from their junior year into their senior year. But, we're not far off from those division one, guys at that level. Mm-hmm.

Dave: 50:25

I would agree. it's right now, the end of July, early August is a real busy time for us in terms of those decisions and commitments coming together. And in many cases it's been as a result of the last few months, from fall visits through, spring visits and certainly now, the recruiting summer exposure part. But we will finish our class, soon and it's all for us early decision commitments. And that's what you have in division three. There's nothing in writing. It's, verbal agreements and a commitment. And we expect those to be honored. And, again, that's part of that transparency and, trust you develop in the recruiting process.

Jay: 51:06

Mm-hmm. And then do you still though at times have seniors in high school visiting? Like if a class isn't filled out, or are you still looking at players in their senior year of high school?

Dave: 51:16

We try to keep a couple spots. There's always we feel a couple difference makers who maybe were, were set on division one and things didn't quite happen, so they kind of come back to you at this point or early in the fall. And, and we found some really good players, later. So we, we try to make sure there's an opportunity for somebody like that. Mm-hmm.

Scott: 51:39

So, yeah, I couldn't agree more. And it, you know, I think that's the other challenging thing for, you know, for young men and recruits and young ladies and their families, is that it happens in so many different ways, on so many different timelines, right? Everybody's got a different journey. Everybody's got a different path. And you just have to be patient in the process and. Keep making yourself better. That's what's gonna get you recruited. Right? It'd be a great person, be great in the classroom and keep getting better on the field.

52:06

And that concludes our compilation on the recruiting process. If you found this information helpful please leave a review and tell a friend about us it'll help support the podcast and keep us going

Ron: 52:19

until we meet again, here to, hoping you find the twine. We're signing off here at the Get the LAX coop. Thanks again so much. We will see you the next time.