Phillylacrosse.com, Posted 1/3/18
From US Lacrosse
Saturday’s Team USA Spring Premiere, an exhibition game for the U.S. men’s national team, will be streamed live on the US Lacrosse website at uslacrosse.org. The Blue-White game will be held at IMG Academy in Bradenton, Fla., and begins at 4:30 p.m. (Eastern).
Saturday’s game will be the final evaluation of the 48-member U.S. men’s team roster before head coach John Danowski and his staff select the 23-player travel roster for this summer’s Federation of International Lacrosse (FIL) World Championship in Netanya, Israel. This will be the seventh U.S. team event Danowski and his staff have used to evaluate potential players since he was named the head coach in late 2015.
The U.S. roster includes three returning all-world players from the most recent FIL World Championship in 2014 – attackman Rob Pannell, midfielder Paul Rabil and defenseman Tucker Durkin (La Salle College High alum, Bryn Athyn head coach, Duke’s LC coach).
Rabil and Durkin were two of the 12 players named to the 2017 All-Major League Lacrosse team, which also included U.S. team members Greg Gurenlian (Springfield-Delco, Penn StateFO), Marcus Holman (A), Jack Kelly (G), Tom Schreiber (Princeton, M), Joel White (D) and Jordan Wolf (Lower Merion, A). Schreiber, the two-time MLL Most Valuable Player, will not participate in the Team USA Spring Premiere due to his National Lacrosse League game with the Toronto Rock on Saturday night.
Since 1967, the U.S. has won the gold or silver medal at every men’s international world championship in field lacrosse. The U.S. won gold in 1967, 1974, 1982, 1986, 1990, 1994, 1998, 2002 and 2010. The U.S. finished as the runner-up to Canada in 1978, 2006 and 2014.
In addition to the Blue-White game, US Lacrosse will offer clinics for players, coaches and officials in conjunction with the Team USA Spring Premiere.
All clinics will include a ticket to the game as part of the registration fee. To sign up for any of the clinics, please visit: https://www.uslacrosse.org/events/national-team-events/spring-premiere