Lacrosse has activated two key routes towards the Los Angeles 2028 Olympic Games. World Lacrosse has confirmed the qualification pathway for the Sixes discipline, while the Premier Lacrosse League -PLL- has closed a $100 million funding round led by Ares Management and Joe Tsai. One development organises sporting access to LA28; the other strengthens the economic base of the sport’s leading professional ecosystem.
Lacrosse will return to the Olympic programme at LA28 with six men’s teams and six women’s teams, in a Sixes format designed to speed up the game and make it easier to present internationally. At the same time, the PLL wants to use that window with more investment in content, sponsorship, women’s development and youth participation. The Olympic pathway organises the route for national teams and federations; the professional investment aims to turn the exposure of Los Angeles into stable growth.
An Olympic pathway in three stages
The qualification process will begin with four continental championships between September and December 2026. The pathway will start with the Pan-American Sixes Lacrosse Championships in Oshawa, Canada; continue with the Asia-Pacific Sixes Lacrosse Championships in Sunshine Coast, Australia; move on to the European Sixes Lacrosse Championships in Salou, Spain; and close with the African Sixes Lacrosse Championships in Johannesburg, South Africa.
Approximately 100 teams will enter that qualification pathway. The continental championships will send the top 16 men’s teams and the top 16 women’s teams to the World Lacrosse Sixes Championships 2027. Continental allocations will be five places per gender for the Pan-American, Asia-Pacific and European regions, and one place per gender for Africa. The structure creates a first global filter before the main world-stage qualifier for the Games.
The world filter before Los Angeles
The World Lacrosse Sixes Championships 2027 will be the first world edition of the Sixes discipline and will have a double function. It will crown the first men’s and women’s world champions in this format and serve as the main Olympic qualifier for LA28. The United States will qualify automatically as host nation, provided its men’s and women’s teams take part in both the Pan-American championship and the WLSC.
In addition to the United States, four men’s national teams and four women’s national teams will secure their Olympic places at the WLSC. Teams must finish in the top 12 to be eligible, under a system that also sets continental limits: at least one team and a maximum of three from each Continental Federation. The six best unqualified teams per gender will then move on to the Final Olympic Qualifying Tournament.
That final tournament is scheduled for early 2028 and will award the remaining place in each draw. It will feature six men’s teams and six women’s teams in a round-robin format, with a final between the top two finishers. The Olympic lacrosse competition at LA28 will be held at Exposition Park Stadium, near Downtown Los Angeles.
The PLL accelerates before the Olympic window
In parallel, the Premier Lacrosse League has closed a Series E funding round of $100 million led by Ares Management and Joe Tsai. The round comes at a moment of growth for the league, which is entering its eighth season and preparing to move from a single-entity structure towards a franchise sales model. Some reports place the PLL’s valuation above $500 million.
The capital will be directed towards four main areas. The first is sponsorship, one of the league’s most valuable assets because of its ability to offer brands access to the men’s circuit, the Women’s Lacrosse League -WLL-, teams, players and youth properties. The second is content, with more investment in storytelling, broadcasts and original production. Actor Glen Powell, one of the new investors, will also join as a creative adviser to work on branding, content development and expansion plans towards Texas.
The women’s league and the youth base
The WLL, launched this year with four teams, is one of the priorities for the new funding. Paul Rabil, co-founder, president and chief creative officer of the PLL, has pointed to the need for greater investment in the on-field product and player development, while also opening the door to future expansion of the women’s league. The move connects directly with LA28, where lacrosse will feature six men’s teams and six women’s teams.
The fourth investment area will be youth lacrosse. The PLL works at grassroots level through nonprofit initiatives and its PLL Play programme, with the aim of increasing participation rather than turning that area into an immediate profit centre. For the league, the sport’s growth before LA28 depends on expanding the number of young players, strengthening identification with teams and athletes, and building audiences before the Olympic spotlight arrives.
Rabil has placed the Games at the centre of that strategy. “The Olympics will be far and away the most people that will have ever watched or heard or seen a version of this sport,” he said. He also argued that lacrosse has “two years to help drive hype with storytelling around players and teams,” a possibility directly linked to the context of LA28. The league is even exploring pre-Games exhibition formats that could help present the sport to new audiences.
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