Weekly News Roundup: The Biggest Headlines in the World of Youth Sports
Anwar Stetson
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🧱 Masters Academy International Making Waves
Elite boarding schools are a fixture in New England, but none have emerged as sports-focused powerhouses.
Masters Academy International plans to change that.
The $84M private athletics academy will open next fall in Stow, Massachusetts, bidding to become a northern equivalent of IMG Academy — keeping elite athletes like Maine native Cooper Flagg in the region while also tapping into the talent-rich Northeast.
“Top athletes want to marry their academics with sport. Many of them leave their public schools looking for better coaches, bigger schedules, better competition, better facilities. But [private schools in the region] are all kind of doing the same and nobody is doing a multi-season sport,” MAI co-founder Peter Masters told Buying Sandlot.
“The secret sauce for us is our ability to carve out over four years almost 2,800 hours more training time than our competition here in New England. And if you join us as a sixth-grader, you’re close to 4,500 more hours.”
The MAI basics:
- Co-founded by brothers Chris and Peter Masters, who own the Boston Junior Bruins youth hockey program
- Located on the site of a former Bose Corporation campus
- Grades 6-12 + a post-graduate year— curriculum partnership with Boston’s Newman School
- Former IMG head of school Rich Odell is part of MAI leadership
- Global schools group Cognita is a lead investor
- 5 hours of academics, 4 hours of sports daily
- Annual tuition in the $50-$70K range
- Applications will begin in September.
MAI teams will compete as independents— the school will not be part of the MIAA.
MAI will offer hockey, baseball, basketball, soccer, lacrosse, figure skating, golf, fencing and esports in Year 1. Future potential sports include football, softball and volleyball.
Masters said MAI will play more local/regional schedules than IMG does.
An early coup for MAI: USA Fencing is exiting Colorado Springs and moving its main operations, including a performance center, to the campus.
“It’s incredible for us,” Masters said. “Our ability to win the bid over the 18 other finalists is a huge feather in our cap. I think it puts us on the national stage right away.”
Construction is underway on the first phase of facilities.
- 3 turf soccer/lacrosse fields
- 2 baseball fields with lights
- 40K-square-foot basketball pavilion with 4 courts
- 13K-square-foot performance center
- 12K-square-foot indoor facility
Hockey will be off-campus for now, but a two-rink facility is planned along with the fencing facility and more turf fields (one with a dome). An adjacent property has grass soccer fields, softball fields and outdoor basketball courts.
You can view additional designs and plans on the public filing page here.
🏈 NFL Flag, Pop Warner Join Forces
NFL Flag and Pop Warner Little Scholars announced a partnership to expand flag football access and opportunities nationwide.
RCX Sports – which partners with pro leagues on youth programs like MLS Go, NHL Street, MLB Pitch, Hit and Run – will support local implementation.
The partnership will launch in December with the jointly-run Crown Classic Flag Football Tournament at the Pop Warner Super Bowl in Charlotte. The event will be open to Pop Warner and non-Pop Warner teams.
The partnership model will allow Pop Warner to integrate NFL FLAG into its existing programming beginning in Spring 2026, inviting local leagues and associations to offer both tackle and non-tackle football under one umbrella, alongside existing cheerleading programs, with the goal of expanding options for every young athlete. The structure of the program is designed to be flexible and inclusive, giving leagues the ability to adapt to the needs of their communities and creating new pathways for girls to play flag football alongside boys.
A release said over 2.4M kids participated in flag football in 2024, making it the fastest-growing youth sport in the country.
Everyone — from the NFL to Disney to Unrivaled Sports — is in big on flag.
Especially girls flag, which is exploding nationwide.
🧢 Sport Specialization May Hinder Pro Chances, Study Finds
Professional athletes who played multiple sports in high school may have a greater chance at success than counterparts who specialized as youth, according to research by a pediatric orthopedic surgeon at UC-San Francisco.
- Dr. Nirav Pandya’s study examined a decade’s worth of NBA first-round draft picks
- Players who played multiple high school sports appeared in 19% more games
- They also had higher player efficiency ratings and were 2X more likely to win individual awards
- Multi-sport athletes also saw less injury occurrence
- Broader research in other sports — NFL, NHL, MLB and Olympic sports — reflected similar trends
💰 Luka Doncic Commits $5M To Youth Sports
The NBA star recently signed a three-year, $165M extension with the Los Angeles Lakers.
One of the first things Doncic did after putting pen to paper: A pledge to support 77 youth athletes worldwide with $5M in funding.
“Basketball gave me everything, and I’m lucky to be able to give back and help the next generation,” Doncic said on X.
The specifics of Doncic’s plans are unclear. But he is already very involved in youth sports. Doncic has his own foundation and commissioned a study on youth basketball in the U.S. and the Balkans (he is from Slovenia).
We went deep on Doncic’s approach — and where it fits into the big picture for youth basketball development — in one of our first deep-dives for Buying Sandlot premium subscribers back in March.
