MYLax was developed with assistance from the Ontario Lacrosse Association (OLA) as it's official statistical database. Both the OLA and MYLax want to expand the use of the site to cover box and field lacrosse, wherever it is played.

MYLax 's ratings are computed mathematically, with no subjective weighting or human determined values. MYLax rates teams based upon how well they play against other teams and how good those teams are. These two factors are "AGD" or "average goal differential" and "SCHED" or "strength of schedule". AGD is currently calculated by accumulating the goal differential of each game. The strength of schedule is computed by averaging the rating of each game opponent. AGD and SCHED are added together to compute a team's rating.

There is no preferential treatment for teams from certain zones. All teams are assumed to be equal and having a rating of zero before the system mathematically calculates your SCHED and AGD based entirely upon game performance. A team's SCHED is not only determined by the teams it plays, but by the teams its opponents play and its opponents' opponents play, etc. All teams in a given age level (i.e. Midgets) are ranked in one statistical pool. The math does not know what zone a team is from or any of the historical ratings of a team, it simply computes a rating based upon who a team has played (SCHED) and how well they have done (AGD) for the games recorded in the current season.

In general, as teams start getting 10+ games under their belts, the system tends to be very accurate. There are, however, some occasional exceptions.

If a group of teams (i.e. zone) doesn't play others outside its group, their placement relative to all other teams cannot be accurately be determined, but relative to one another it is accurate. Groups of teams with limited outside play can be inaccurately skewed by the scores of only a few games, which might not be representative of the group's overall ability. Accuracy significantly increases with more games and more interplay and it makes sense for there to be a minimum number of games before teams are ranked.

Assuming teams have all played enough games against both league and non-league teams, inaccuracies may still exist. Some teams play differently (a lot differently) depending upon which goalie is in net for a specific game. In this case, the ratings average out the play and may not completely reflect either scenario. Missing players, home vs. away, double rostered players are a few other scenarios that could influence the accuracy of the ratings. It's not an exact science. The ratings should be used to determine what teams might be good non-league opponents and which bracket of a tournament may be more appropriate, they are not meant to be the AP Poll for youth lacrosse.

There are a couple weaknesses to the current system. The first deficiency is with teams that emphasize development in some games. They are "penalized". That same team may then focus on winning big tournaments and succeed, but may never achieve the rating that they "deserve". Secondly, teams that "come on" in the second half of the season are "penalized" by early poor performances. All games throughout the season count equally and that may not reflect a teams performance near the end of the season.

Yes, it seems wrong, but a team that you have a winning record against can be ranked ahead of you. It's all in mathematics. It depends on who else your team has played and how well you did as well as who the other team has played and how well they did. In a season of games, there will be some anomalies.

Your rating can go down even though your team wins. This can happen for a couple different reasons. First, if your team is rated 3.0 points (1 point = 1 goal) better than your opponent and you win two close games by 1 goal each, your average goal differential (AGD) is +1.0 against a team that it was expected to be +3.0. This would likely have a negative impact on your rating. Another scenario has you doing as expected against your opponent, but a large percentage of the teams you played earlier in the season doing unexpectedly bad. This lowers your strength of schedule and would lower your team's rating. It is almost impossible to guess how much and in what direction your rating will move each week because of the complexity of the math. MYLax now has available a page that explains the mathematics behind the rating. From the team information page, you can find a link to the math page by clicking on the icon just to the right of the rating.

Everything is relative. The number specifically means nothing, but might be used to understand the relative competitiveness of two different teams. A 1.0 point differential equates to a theoretical goal 1.0 goal advantage by the team with the higher point value.

"Record" is represented by wins-loses-ties. As described above, the "Rating" is simply the sum of the "AGD" and "SCHED". "AGD" is average goal differential. This can be a positive or negative number that equals goals for (GF) minus goals against (GA) divided by games played (GP). One caveat, the system currently has a maximum goal differential of ten (10) for any single game played. This means that if a team plays a number of games decided by more than seven goals, it's not quite as simple as GF-GA/GP. "SCHED" is the average strength of schedule of all opponents. Fundamentally you can add the "RATING" for all opponents and divide by GP. "Details" will give you more information about the team while "Scores" is a link to a team's complete set of season game scores as recorded in MYLax.

A couple hints to give you the full power of MYLax. Any teams with known team websites will be represented by underline/hotlinked team names. Clicking on the team name will open an additional window to this team's web site. When viewing scores, each opponent's schedule is just a click away. For example, if you are viewing the game scores of Team X and they played Team Y, you can view Team Y's game scores by simply clicking on Team Y's name.

MYLax now includes Boys and Girls, Tyke through Intermediate Box Lacrosse teams throughout Ontario. We will begin building out the system to include US and Canada club teams in the near future. Want to help? Send MYLax an email. Let's make it happen together.

Next to every score in the database is a red check mark in the "Fix" column. If a score is incorrect, click on the corresponding check mark to request that it be fixed. Please provide documentation (website that has the correct score posted is preferable) and tell us specifically how to fix the score. If the score is a duplicate, especially an incorrect duplicate, make sure you request that we delete the duplicate score.

MYLax is working on making all information correctable via an online form, but association information has not yet been completed. You will see a pencil icon just to the right of association information when the online correction form has been implemented. Until then, use the contact information found on the Contact Info page.