PolyAthletics
Boys’ Lacrosse
WELCOME! Our Preliminary Application for 2026-27 is now closed.
Program Overview
Having first fielded a team more than a century ago, Poly boasts the oldest continuous high school lacrosse program in the country, according to US Lacrosse. The program is headed by Lou Candel, a former All-America at Amherst, the coaching staff also features assistants with professional and elite collegiate backgrounds. Our goal for our players at Poly Prep is to look back many years from now and recall their experience with Poly Lax as a positive and memorable one.
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Boys Lacrosse Highlights
2024
NYSAIS Champions
2024
Ivy Prep League Champions
#1
Lou Candel – NYSAIS Boys’ Lacrosse Coach of the Year (2023, 2024)
107
Years – Longest continuous high school program in the country.
☆
Former Harvard All-American and MLL Lizards star Bobby Duvnjak has been our assistant coach (2020-Present)
Boys’ Lacrosse Head Coach
Lou Candel
Business Phone: (718) 836-9800 ext. 3780
Education: Amherst College, BA
The son of a celebrated lacrosse and basketball coach at Nassau Community College, Lou Candel starred in both sports while growing up on Long Island, eventually becoming a Division III All-America attackman in lacrosse and team captain in basketball at Amherst College. After graduation, his professional career took him to Wall Street, local arenas as a sports reporter for Newsday, and back to Long Island as owner of the Ultimate Gaga event venue. All the while, he retained his ties to lacrosse as a youth coach, before taking over the Poly boys’ program in 2017. Candel, who also coaches the boys’ JV basketball team, states that his main goal is “for this to be an experience for the kids to look back 20 years from now and remember the positive athletic experience they had and the friends they made. In 2023 and 2024, Candel was named NYSAIS Boys’ Lacrosse Coach of the Year. In 2025, Lou Candel became Head of Athletics at Poly Prep.
Away from Poly, he serves as lacrosse director at Camp Wayne for Boys in Pennsylvania and is a board member of the Joe Lapchick Character Award Foundation.
As an athlete, Lou Candel
- Was a Three-Year Starter and a 1988 Division III All-American
- Led Division III in Assists in 1987 and 1988 and was selected for the prestigious North vs. South All-Star Game played at Johns Hopkins.
Lacrosse Facilities
Our lacrosse teams practice and compete at the Steinberg Athletic Complex.
Contact