NLL roster analysis: Where today’s talent comes from
Evan Constantopoulos, Oakville Buzz (Photo: Dave Fryer/OJLL)
We’re entering Week 2 of the National Lacrosse League’s 2024-25 regular season, and by the end of the weekend all 14 of the league’s teams will have at least one game under the belts.
As The Lax Mag has done in the past, both through an in-depth, decade-plus analysis of NLL rosters, plus last year’s NLL Factories feature, we’re again diving into player’s bio details to confirm where today’s talent comes from.
On Wednesday of this week, we pulled full rosters - beyond just active players - from the most dialed-in destination for NLL lineups, SwarmItUp.com. It’s a fan run account, by the cherished Corporal (AKA Josh Hoffman of Minnesota), who provides a detailed breakdown of every team’s roster through the multitude of league lineup levels (active, practice player, injured reserve, hold out, physically unable to perform, etc.). Most if not all NLL teams use it to see today’s rosters too, plus past, present and future draft details. The site is an unofficial yet very trusted source in the sport.
Like our recently released 2024-25 NLL Top 100, we only included players expected and/or available to play this year. Anyone on their team’s draft list, a hold out that appears to be MIA for the season or someone sustaining a season-ending injury were not included, since our focus is on the current NLL season.
The last time we looked at where NLL players came from was just before the 2021-22 campaign was about to kick off. While we confirmed where players hailed from, we also tried to tie that into where they developed their lacrosse-playing skills (for example, although Brodie Merrill was born in Quebec, he grew up playing the sport in Ontario). We also focussed on active rosters, since full rosters, like we’re looking at today, were unavailable going back as far as we researched (from 2011-2022) for that feature. Here’s how that analysis shook out…
2021/22 Opening Day Rosters
Ontario - 58.17%
British Columbia - 22.79%
United States - 8.84%
Indigenous - 6.46%
Alberta - 3.40%
Quebec - 0.34%
This year, as previously stated, we expanded our roster pull a bit to the various sub categories teams have under their main active roster. We also focussed more on simply where players were from, versus attributing them to a region where they developed at a higher level, which in the small handful of cases that occurred the last time, was usually either Ontario or British Columbia. Here are this year’s background breakdowns…
2024/25 Opening Day Rosters
Ontario - 55.62%
British Columbia - 19.52%
United States - 11.23%
Indigenous - 6.95%
Alberta 5.08%
Nova Scotia 0.80%
Manitoba 0.53%
Quebec 0.27%
Ontario and British Columbia drop by a few percentage points, but that’s largely due to not counting out-of-province players who mostly developed in ON or BC, and also now including practice players, who are often locals in their various NLL markets. Both Americans and Albertans see a slow but steady climb, even though some of those additionals come courtesy of practice squad spots. Indigenous player representation stays almost exactly the same.
So, to summarize, not a whole lot has changed over the past few seasons, and the minimal movement we did see can mostly be attributed to our expanded review of rosters this year.
When it comes to which Junior A programs fuel the league, the usual suspects we highlighted last year, again, rule rosters for the most part: Orangeville Northmen, St. Catharines Athletics, Whitby Warriors, Six Nations Arrows, Coquitlam Adanacs, etc.
As far as player’s hometowns, one are of continued growth was the amount of players in the NLL that come from Ontario’s Halton Region: Oakville, Burlington, Halton Hills (Acton/Georgetown) and Milton. Of the 374 players included in our analysis, 11% of today’s NLLers hail from Halton, with more than half coming from Oakville.
Before the 2022 season, we asked Oakville’s own Dan & Paul Dawson…
TLM: You were both two of the early Oakville guys that made it to the NLL. Now it seems like there’s Oakville boys on every roster. Why?
Paul: Yeah, it's crazy. I'd say you look at a guy like Rob McDougall, God rest his soul, he's one of the guys that made this growth possible. But if you look at the TRAC (Toronto Rock Athletic centre) in Oakville, you're now seeing the fruits of that facility. And with the youth development happening at the TRAC today, you’d have to think that Oakville number in the NLL will double in another ten years. Oakville lacrosse has exploded.
Dan: For us, and Pauly’s teams were a lot better than mine growing up, but we were a B centre, tops. Oakville barely had enough to fill one team from both age groups back then. The younger group and the older age group now, they've got two and three teams at certain ages. So, like Pauly said, it goes to obviously the countless hours and effort from the volunteers and board members in Oakville Minor, but let's be honest, if you build it, they will come. And that’s what’s happening at the TRAC. It’s been a game changer.
Dan Dawson at the Toronto Rock Athletic Centre (Photo: Dave Fryer)