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Message: [QUOTE="DoctahLexus, post: 3026224, member: 6798"] I think there is still excellent talent in upstate new york but there seems to be less depth of skilled players on most high school teams when compared to Long Island, the greater Baltimore area, and increasingly so in the New England/Penn prep school scene. The level of play is much higher overall in those areas and more college ready talent is produced as a result. Upstate NY’s aging and overall decreasing population could certainly play a role in that, among other factors. In spite of that the actual top talent in the area still stacks up with the rest of the nation. Connor Fields, Ben Reeves, TD Ierlan, Connor Canizzaro, Dylan Donahue, Luke Goldstock, Jake Pulver, Scott Firman, Nick Mellen, Sean Eccles, Zed Williams, Zach Miller, and the list goes on (to some extent at least). If you were to put the Upstate NY (for simplicity sake calling upstate everything but the greater NYC/long island area) NCAA allstar team of the last 3 or 4 years against any other regions all star lineup, we would have a shot at winning, and I don’t think there is any argument against that. But if the second/reserve teams in this imaginary competition went against Long Island’s or MD’s, or New England’s, their second teams would probably win, and unfortunately there is not much of an argument against that either. Still we are seeing top talent come out of the area to this day. Two of the most promising freshman this year (Chase Ierlan goalie at Cornell and Chase Scanlan middie at Loyola) hail from Upstate NY, and Griffin Cook has shown some signs of a bright future. Jon jon Lombardi at Cornell is another highly rated recruit hailing from Rochester who could have a breakout year. I don't think it's gotten to the point where a kid playing in Upstate NY who is dominating the competition in high school will likely fade away when going up against the best of D1 competition from other areas. It is still an area of the nation not to be overlooked by recruiters. But I agree it cannot be the area we live and die by for recruiting. Clearly the staff agrees as they further pursue talent from MD and New Jersey, along with continuing our recruiting of those trustee Canadians. [/QUOTE]

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