There is only one week left in the 2024 regular season, and every team has exactly one game left except Rochester, who has two. There are still two playoff spots up for grabs, and five teams (Panther City, Vancouver, Saskatchewan, New York, and Rochester, in descending order of likelihood) trying to get one of them. There are eight games next weekend, and even the very last one (Philly at Rochester, Sunday at 3pm EDT) could have playoff implications; there are scenarios where Rochester gets the last playoff spot if they win that game, and Vancouver gets it otherwise. Talk about down to the wir ..read more

In October 2010, one of the greatest players in the game and a box lacrosse legend was traded for another one. After ten seasons, one missed season, a Rookie of the Year award, an NLL Championship, and an MVP award, John Grant, Jr. was traded from the Rochester Knighthawks to the Colorado Mammoth for reigning goaltender of the year Matt Vinc. Three other players as well as a few draft picks were also involved in this blockbuster, which transformed both teams. Some of those draft picks wouldn’t be made for almost three years, and the full extent of the trade wasn’t felt for quite a while. Here ..read more

There were nine games this past weekend and every game had playoff implications for one or both teams playing and in some cases, a couple of other teams as well. That, by itself, is the first Awesome of the week. But there’s more! Awesome Close games! On Friday night, three of the games were decided by two goals. The other was decided by four but only because of three goals in the last two minutes. Bandits/Mammoth were tied seven times, Rush/Roughnecks wasn’t that close through most of the game but Saskatchewan put up a good fight in the last few minutes to make it a two-goal game, Halifax/Van ..read more

Every now and again, I see a stat or an old NLL boxscore that surprises me, because it shows a player playing for a team that I’d forgotten he ever played for. What, Jimmy Quinlan wasn’t always with the Rush? Mark Steenhuis wasn’t a Bandit his whole career? Callum Crawford has played in lots of places but… Calgary? Then recently, someone on an NLL podcast (I think it was Pat Gregoire but if it wasn’t, my apologies to whoever it was) said something about this very thing. He even called me out by name, suggesting that I write about it. All right then. Challenge accepted. Here are a bunch of play ..read more

Only three weeks to go before playoffs begin! Of course, the three weeks have 9, 6, and 8 games, so there’s still a lotta lacrosse left, and tons of playoff scenarios. Unless you’re a Las Vegas fan, your team still has a shot of making the playoffs, and if you’re a Toronto, Albany, or San Diego fan, your team is already in! There were only four games last week but a few awesome things happened, so let’s have a look. Awesome Dhane and Josh Simply put, Dhane Smith and Josh Byrne are one of the most potent scoring duos in league history. In fact, as of now, they are arguably tops on that list. I ..read more

What a week! Entirely home team wins except in Philly, four OT games, a few big comebacks, a last-place team almost beating a second-place team, a player tying a legend for a goals record, and another player almost tying another one. Let’s get to it! Awesome Comebacks We had a few big comebacks this past weekend. In two of these games, the winning team started off down 4-0, did not score in the first quarter at all, and tied it up late in the fourth. In both games, neither team reached 10 goals. I wrote about the Rock’s OT victory over the Thunderbirds here, and the other comeback game was the ..read more

What a crazy game. This was one of those weird games where the Rock never led in the game at all, but still won. The shots on net numbers were wacky and there were a lot of penalties on both sides until the fourth quarter, when there were none. The Thunderbirds got off to a strong start, with both their offense and defense clicking. There were some great passes and four goals at one end, while Warren Hill was excellent and kept the Rock scoreless through the first quarter. The Rock finally got on the board early in the second and added a couple more before Cody Jamieson extended the Halifax le ..read more

I didn’t get a chance to do a week 14 report but it would have been minimal since I only saw the Rock/Desert Dogs game. I did watch the Rock/Seals game later on but that’s it. This week however, there were eight games and I watched a good chunk of them. I even had multiple games on at the same time for a while – Rush/Bandits on one screen and Roughnecks/Swarm on the other, since both games were tied in the final minutes of the fourth quarter. I muted Buffalo while Georgia was in OT, and as soon as the Swarm scored the game-winner, I killed that feed and went back to Buffalo and managed to see ..read more

This past weekend, I added one to the list of NLL arenas I have visited, though I have to say that number is still pretty small (Toronto, Hamilton, Buffalo, Rochester, and now Vegas) compared to other people I know. My family and I (and a bunch of friends – 17 total) travelled to Las Vegas last Wednesday night and went to the Rock / Desert Dogs game on Friday. As I’ve mentioned before, my friend Mike is Shawn Williams’ uncle, and so when we found that the Rock were going to Vegas, Mike asked Shawn if he could get tickets for us, which he did. Thanks Shawn! We also saw a show at Sphere, did a v ..read more

Games were all over the place this past weekend. A couple of one goal games, one in overtime, and also an eight-goal game and a thirteen-goal blowout. One game with 28 goals, two with 25, and one with 14. The first place teams (Toronto and Albany) won and the last place team (Vancouver) lost, but Colorado and Las Vegas also won and Georgia and Buffalo lost. Calgary and Panther City are moving up, while Philadelphia and Rochester are dropping. Man, this season is fun, isn’t it? Awesome Riptide relocating to Ottawa As I’m sure you’ve heard, the league announced this week that the New York Riptid ..read more