Stop Only Dodging Short-Stick Defensive Midfielders

As I’m sure everyone reading this article already knows, there are always four poles and two short-stick defensive midfielders on the field during a settled offensive possession. At just about every level of lacrosse today, you can hear it echoing from the sidelines — a coach screaming, “Jimmy has a matchup” or “dodge the shorties.” On paper, this makes sense. It is hard to consistently win dodges against long poles because of their longer sticks and typically better defensive ability.

For most teams, short-stick defensive midfielders usually fall into one of three categories. They might be really athletic players with poor stick skills. They might be mid-tier offensive players who don’t quite have a role. Or they are brand new to the game. In all three cases, defense is not their specialty. Sure, once in a while you’ll get a player who fully buys into being a short stick defensive midfielder and develops the position at a high level. Sadly, that’s the exception, not the rule. More often, it’s a player being thrown into the role because the coach doesn’t know what else to do with them — but they know they need to have at least two short sticks on the field when they are playing defense.

Obviously, this becomes an easier matchup for offensive players to dodge on. This painfully obvious concept is pretty common lacrosse IQ at every level of the game. But it has gotten to a point where it is now over-relied upon. Let’s say you are watching a high school lacrosse game with no coaches on the field. It’s just players, playing the game they love with no sideline guidance. Even in that situation, players would still only look to attack the short sticks. They would even get mad at each other if someone dodged on a long pole and it didn’t work.

We’ve hammered this concept into players at such a young age that now it carries up through high school and even college as if it’s some golden rule. I hate to be the one to say it, but there are six defenders on the field and they are all human beings. Just because they have a long pole in their hands does not mean they are impossible to dodge on.

While the easier advantage is obviously dodging short sticks, you are seriously limiting an athlete’s development and the offense’s ability to be creative when that’s the only approach. If a defense knows you are going to dodge the short sticks every time, why would those short sticks even allow their offensive player to touch the ball? They should push out and take away the passing outlet, forcing you to dodge a pole. And when this happens, you can literally see the fear in the offensive player’s eyes because they know they now have to beat a pole, and they have zero confidence that they can.

This game, just like any other sport, is all about confidence. We have reached a point where we are not encouraging athletes to beat long poles at a young age, so when the moment comes, they don’t believe they can. Go watch high-level lacrosse, whether it’s college or professional. All of those players can dodge on poles, and no, it’s not just because they are better. It’s because they have the confidence and the will to do it — and because they’ve been taught they should.