Billed as a warm weather recruiting showcase, the Paradise Shootout showed promise in its early years. The fourth edition, completed last weekend in Naples, has evolved into a high quality local and junior event, spiced with some out of state competition and run exquisitely by Corrigan Sports Enterprises. As usual, the fields were beautiful and the staffing and services were excellent. We did see Team USA and Furman head coach Richie Meade. FLN as you know is an unabashed proponent of our Florida laxers and we hope to give them a hand in this article.
First, congratulations go to Elite division winners Palm Beach Revolution 2015 (shown in the featured photo, above). Led by Oxbridge Academy and Florida Launch coach Stan Ross, this all-star team of college commits was clearly the best of class. Familiar names who played as you would have expected them to included Jupiter’s Zach Crotty, Conor Alexander and Viper Scheele, Benjamin’s Andrew Packer and Chris Erdmann and Jensen Beach’s Jack Staab. These young men have worked hard for years and this event had to be fun. We look forward to watching them one more time this spring.
Players who impressed us (and we are sure we missed a few) included the following:
Swordfish (Runner-Up)
Mostly a St. Andrew’s roster, we saw a a lot of fine play. Face-off senior Alex Newhouse is one of the best in the state and on Saturday he had an acrobatic backwards over the head goal which was certainly one of highlights of the weekend. The attack unit of Peter Dykas, Sam Baker and Nick Diamond (all juniors) was strong. Nick’s twin brother, midfielder Davis, is a special player, feeding and scoring with style. Shane Logan and Alex Heatzig were solid on defense and Harris Feldman in goal was athletic and showed good decision making all weekend.
Swashbucklers
Emerging as one of the quality true club teams, Swash showed well. 2015 attackman Tyler Martin of Vero Beach scored almost at will. Vero teammate 2016 middie Chris Britton scored roughly two goals a game and FLN thinks Chris is someone with tremendous potential. Defensemen Austin Paxson (2016, Dwyer) and Hunter Ramsay (2016, Calvary Christian) created difficult match-ups. Senior face-off middie Johnny Hanlon of Pope John Paul II played at a high level.
Shark Rhinos
Comprised of mostly Gulf Coast players, we will be interested to see just how good they will be in the spring when joined by their football playing teammates. This core group was plenty tough, led by seniors Bo Garrison, Daniel London, Matt Shover and Sterling Desourcy. We enjoyed watching the resilient Austin Miller who had some beautiful rips. Defensemen Tim Monette and AJ Radnunz stood out with their stick skills and intelligent play.
Madlax
Madlax Florida made up of mostly Barron Collier laxers had a good tournament, losing in the semis to eventual champion Palm Beach Revolution. FLN caught a few minutes of their pool play game against cross town rival Rhinos which was an 8-7 thriller in favor of Madlax. Drew Goodrich (mid and attack) seemed to draw the attention of the opposing team’s best defender. He had a number of nice goals against the Rhinos. Other players of note included freshman Sean Mahoney who looks to be a face-off force in the years ahead, midfielder Becket Haglund, attackman Pat Mahoney and goalie Zach Woods. Word has it Senior Writer Lee Roggenburg has put a lofty pre-season ranking on BC.
Division Winners:
High School Elite: Palm Beach Revolution 2015
High School Varsity: New Wave Ion
High School JV: New Wave Volt
U15A: Long Island Express 2019
U15B: Madlax Florida
U13: TRUE Black State
U11: Monsters
Booker Corrigan with his 2016 Maryland RoughridersSwash Pals
First, congratulations go to Elite division winners Palm Beach Revolution 2015 (shown in the featured photo, above). Led by Oxbridge Academy and Florida Launch coach Stan Ross, this all-star team of college commits was clearly the best of class. Familiar names who played as you would have expected them to included Jupiter’s Zach Crotty, Conor Alexander and Viper Scheele, Benjamin’s Andrew Packer and Chris Erdmann and Jensen Beach’s Jack Staab. These young men have worked hard for years and this event had to be fun. We look forward to watching them one more time this spring.
Players who impressed us (and we are sure we missed a few) included the following:
Swordfish (Runner-Up)
Mostly a St. Andrew’s roster, we saw a a lot of fine play. Face-off senior Alex Newhouse is one of the best in the state and on Saturday he had an acrobatic backwards over the head goal which was certainly one of highlights of the weekend. The attack unit of Peter Dykas, Sam Baker and Nick Diamond (all juniors) was strong. Nick’s twin brother, midfielder Davis, is a special player, feeding and scoring with style. Shane Logan and Alex Heatzig were solid on defense and Harris Feldman in goal was athletic and showed good decision making all weekend.
Swashbucklers
Emerging as one of the quality true club teams, Swash showed well. 2015 attackman Tyler Martin of Vero Beach scored almost at will. Vero teammate 2016 middie Chris Britton scored roughly two goals a game and FLN thinks Chris is someone with tremendous potential. Defensemen Austin Paxson (2016, Dwyer) and Hunter Ramsay (2016, Calvary Christian) created difficult match-ups. Senior face-off middie Johnny Hanlon of Pope John Paul II played at a high level.
Shark Rhinos
Comprised of mostly Gulf Coast players, we will be interested to see just how good they will be in the spring when joined by their football playing teammates. This core group was plenty tough, led by seniors Bo Garrison, Daniel London, Matt Shover and Sterling Desourcy. We enjoyed watching the resilient Austin Miller who had some beautiful rips. Defensemen Tim Monette and AJ Radnunz stood out with their stick skills and intelligent play.
Madlax
Madlax Florida made up of mostly Barron Collier laxers had a good tournament, losing in the semis to eventual champion Palm Beach Revolution. FLN caught a few minutes of their pool play game against cross town rival Rhinos which was an 8-7 thriller in favor of Madlax. Drew Goodrich (mid and attack) seemed to draw the attention of the opposing team’s best defender. He had a number of nice goals against the Rhinos. Other players of note included freshman Sean Mahoney who looks to be a face-off force in the years ahead, midfielder Becket Haglund, attackman Pat Mahoney and goalie Zach Woods. Word has it Senior Writer Lee Roggenburg has put a lofty pre-season ranking on BC.
