College Lacrosse Week 7: The Midway Point Has Come and Gone
This past week of college lacrosse was littered with key matchups throughout every conference. The key matchups led to a not-so-new No. 1 reclaiming the throne.
The Virginia Cavaliers are back on top. Virginia is the true class of college lacrosse and had a one-week vacation from the No. 1 spot before reclaiming the distinguished honor.
Connor Shellenberger scored two goals and tallied five assists en route to defeating Notre Dame. The Fighting Irish held the No. 1 poll spot during the Cavaliers' week vacation from the top.
The Kavanagh brothers finally found a defense that could contain them, preventing them from continuing on a long win streak dating back to April of last season.
Outside of the ACC, there were plenty of other great games that featured college lacrosse’s brightest stars.
In the IVY League, a matchup between Yale and Princeton resulted in 33 goals being scored in 60 minutes of action.
The Tigers bit deep into the jugular of the Bulldogs, defeating them 23-10 on Sherrerd Field.
Coulter Mackesy paved the way for Princeton scoring eight goals and assisting on a pair as well. Chris Lyons scored half the number of goals that Mackesy did, which is just one of the many reasons why Yale lost on Saturday.
In another IVY League contest that featured only 19 goals, a long streak was snapped by Dartmouth. The Big Green secured its first IVY League win since 2015.
Colin McGill had four goals and an assist for Dartmouth, and Teddy Malone had the same stat line for Harvard.
The game featured plenty of action and was one for the history books in the case of the Big Green.
Dartmouth has been much improved this season and could prove to be a top team in the conference as the season ages.
The Army Black Knights are a team that has not been focused on enough throughout these articles, and they deserve way more respect.
The Black Knights are 7-1 this season and have won seven straight. They don’t have the toughest schedule, but wins over Rutgers, Lehigh and Loyola will be important come May.
However, in the contest against Loyola, the Black Knights allowed one of the best names in lacrosse to tally a sweet goal.
Mustang Sally, a senior midfielder for the Greyhounds wandered through the entire Army defense and scored a beauty. The final score of the game was 10-5 in favor of Army and was a huge win for the Black Knights.
Penn State fell to Maryland and lost back-to-back games for the first time all season. The Terrapins have a stout defensive and explosive offense. Both were on display Saturday resulting in a 13-10 victory for Maryland.
Jack Traynor had four of the ten goals for Penn State and shot eighty percent on the afternoon. Maryland had scoring come from the entire lineup and had a little too much firepower for the Nittany Lions.
Johns Hopkins defeated Michigan in the late-night matinee matchup on Big Ten Network. Russel Melendez, Brendan Grimes and Garrett Degnon combined for 13 of the 15 goals that the Blue Jays scored.
These are the games that stood out this week, but there are plenty of other games that were spectacular on the weekend. April is coming and that means conference play will start to hit its next gear in the coming weeks.
Connor Shellenberger is the favorite for the Tewaaraton right now, closely followed by CJ Kirst. Expect to see exciting contests throughout the entire weekend, especially in the ACC, B1G and IVY conferences.
Hayden Lewis is a first-year majoring in broadcast journalism. To contact him, please email lewis1818hayden@gmail.com.
