BOSTON — Thomas Anderson of Holden, an eighth-grader at Mountview Middle School, was selected to the Mass Bay Colonials boy’s lacrosse team that will travel to Houston, Texas, Dec. 10-11 to compete in the Best of Texas Lacrosse Tournament. Thomas was selected from more than 200 athletes from 125 town lacrosse programs from Central and Eastern Massachusetts.
“The Mass Bay Colonials is an extension of our community- based youth league, Mass Youth Lacrosse, and was founded to promote and celebrate town-based lacrosse and the elite athletes who commit to their communities each spring,” said Joey Picard, Colonials founder and General Manager.
Thomas is a sixth-year player with Wachusett YouthLacrosseProgram. He plays LSM.
In addition to performance at the tryouts, players submitted recommendations from coaches, teachers and community leaders in order to earn a spot from the selection committee. The Colonials seek to not only bring the most talented youth lacrosse players from Massachusetts, but the players who can proudly represent the state on and off the field.
2022 is the third iteration of the Mass Bay Colonials, but the first time with both a boys’ and a girls’ team, as Mass Youth Lacrosse added a girls league to the organization in 2022. The Mass Bay Colonials will send a boys’ team (class of 2027) and a girls team (class of 2027/2028) to Houston to compete against teams from Texas, Oklahoma, Missouri and others from across the Southwest.
The 2027 Boys Team will be led by head coach Nathan Kittler. Kittler is the head coach at Natick High School and was named the 2022 Eastern Mass Lacrosse Coach’s Association Coach of the Year. Kittler will be assisted by Ed McCarthy, a longtime youth and high school coach who has been a Mass Youth Lacrosse Coach Education trainer for the past five years. Rounding out the coaching staff is Tom Spangenberg, the current Chair of Mass Youth Lacrosse Board of Directors, former president of the board, and longtime youth coach with Dover-Sherborn Youth Lacrosse.
The 2022 Mass Bay Colonials Boys team will have 22 athletes representing youth lacrosse programs in Andover, Cambridge, Framingham, Grafton, Hamilton-Wenham, Holliston, King Philip, Lexington, Marblehead, Melrose, Natick, Newburyport, North Andover, North Central, Norwood, Pentucket, Reading, Stoneham, Wachusett and Wayland.
Massachusetts Youth Lacrosse, or MYL, a nonprofit 501 (c)3 organization, was founded in 1992 by a group of town youth lacrosse programs that had the common goal to promote the growth of the game of lacrosse throughout Massachusetts by providing leadership, guidance, training and structure to anyone interested in lacrosse. More than 110 town programs participate in MYL with over 1,000 teams and 14,000 players participating in an 8-week Spring Season followed by the largest youth lacrosse Jamboree in the country over two weekends in Devens. In spring 2022, a Girls League launched with 21 town programs and 2,000 girl players. More than 70 girls programs will be participating in 2023. For more information, visit www.massyouthlax. org.
