From the podcast: Max Rosner of Taft on managing expectations

New Taft head coach Max Rosner is this week's guest on the "Chasing The Goal" podcast. (Courtesy)

On this week’s episode of New England Lacrosse Journal’s “Chasing The Goal” podcast, hosts Kyle Devitte and Jack Piatelli talk with new Taft head coach Max Rosner.

This is Rosner’s first season at the helm of the program after serving as an assistant previously. He inherits a talented squad thanks in no small part to the efforts of former head coach Nic Bell, who departed after the ‘23 season to take over the program at St. Anne’s Belfield in Charlottesville, Va.

Rosner (Brunswick, Maine) is a Bowdoin graduate who has coached and/or taught in the prep ranks with the Westtown School, MacLean and the Potomac School.

He also has an extensive background in the club ranks, coaching with NXT in multiple roles and serving as an Under Armour Underclass tournament team assistant.

Watch the full podcast below on YouTube. It’s also available on all major podcast platforms. If you enjoy it, please leave a rating and a review. Watch more episodes on the Chasing the Goal podcast channel.

Here are some excerpts from the pod.

Jack Piatelli: Can you talk about the difference between parents’ expectations and the players’ expectations? How do you manage both? 

Max Rosner: We are really open and honest with families — we have a very direct line of communication. It’s always evolving, particularly because the nature of his sport is always evolving. In terms of now, there are showcases and then there are these combine-like events that are invite-only.

Should my kid going to be this? Why is my kid on a ranked list? This is a subjective list that someone has created, and it exists on social media and everyone is entitled to their own opinion. Rankings are not an indictment on your kid. They don’t have less value. That’s just what that person is saying. And we have a lot of conversations individually with parents. We talk a lot about focusing on what we think is really important, and that’s first and foremost your academics here. If you can do well academically it keeps a lot of doors open. The things we are asking you to do, we are creating opportunities for you in the offseason to have that success.

But when it comes to perception vs. reality, in regards to parents, they think their kids hung the moon. I hope every parent feels that way about their kid. But in the end, I hope that parents trust me in guiding them to say, “This is just not going to be achievable.” Or, it may be achievable if you do these things, and even then it may not tilt in your favor. But we try and have those conversations. I don’t know if it’s always received with a smile.

Kyle Devitte: When you and I spoke earlier this week, we were talking about last season. You go 15-2 and it’s a great season, right? I asked you what expectations were for this season and you’re like, “Listen, we could go 13-4 but we don’t want to go 13-4. That’s not what we expect. We want to win.” You basically just stop short of saying we want to win all of our games. Do you think that places a lot of pressure on you and the kids, or do you just think that the expectations are already there and you’re just going to execute?

Max Rosner: I think the pressure will always be there for the top teams. I think if you have X number of committed guys, the expectation is you will do well, right? That is just the standard bar that you are placed at. I think for our guys, they work really hard right in their offseason development. They’re physically in the weight room and meeting with coaches. We’re realistic about where we think players’ roles are on the team. But I think you don’t come to Taft to be the superstar. You come to play.

I think if we are playing our best ball, we are pretty dang hard to beat. Just top to bottom — we have all the pieces. We have a face-off unit. We’ve got a goalie room, we’ve got lefties, we’ve got righties. We have some real supreme athletes. We’ve got some selfless guys who are demons. We really are a great mix of talent.

The goal is to play to our potential and have all of the guys buying in and doing their job. We’re going to be pretty tough to beat. I think those pressures will always be there. But again, these guys would not be choosing to come to Taft if they were scared of that pressure or didn’t want it. 

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