Are the best times ahead for DU men’s and women’s lacrosse this season? We have reached the midway point of this lacrosse season and both teams are well-positioned for solid second-half runs and NCAA Tournament appearances. However, there is still work to be done.
Overall, both teams are on track for NCAA bids, assuming they finish the BIG EAST regular season and conference tournaments on winning notes. However, both teams have room for improvement.
Men’s lacrosse (6-1) is sitting at #5 (USILA) nationally. The Pioneers are coming off a road win against Big Ten Ohio State and have a neutral-site matchup this upcoming weekend against #2 Duke (8-1) in the College Lacrosse Live series in Severn, Maryland. This is Denver’s final tune-up before entering Big EAST Conference play. Georgetown and Villanova appear to be the biggest threats as well as opportunities to enhance their overall RPI and NCAA Tournament seeding. Here is how the DU men have fared against ranked opponents, with only the Yale home loss as a blemish:
Denver vs. the USILA Top-25
No. 3 Duke – March 24 – Neutral (in Baltimore, Md.)
No. 9 Yale – March 10 – L, 13-15
No. 10 Georgetown – April 13 – Home
No. 11 Cornell – February 24 – W, 17-16
No. 13 Johns Hopkins – Away – W, 13-12 (OT)
The DU men’s team is loaded with veterans. Denver has five players with nine or more goals, led by JJ Sillstrop with 18 goals and 9 assists. Michael Lampert leads DU in assists with 13 along with 13 goals. Noah Manning has 14 goals and 6 assists. Denver plays with efficiency and experience but does not have the explosiveness to overcome large deficits against very good teams.
When examining team statistics, Denver is 10th in faceoff percentage – Alex Stathekis has done a great job at the ‘X ‘. When it comes to man-up and man-down, DU is a Top-10 team. Denver generally ranks in the top half of DI lacrosse in key statistical categories. However, Denver could improve their possessions on securing groundballs and clearing, DU is 52/73 on groundballs and ranked 43/73 on clearing.
The next two games should tell us a lot as the Denver men face Duke and the following week they begin conference play on the road against Villanova. If they can win both of those games, they cement a near-certain NCAA Tournament berth – as long as they do not fall apart in conference play. They will be playing for seeding and home-field for the NCAA Tournament. Either way, based on their performance this season, they will be an NCAA Tournament participant as expected.
#13 (IWLCA) DU women’s lacrosse fell to 3-3 with losses to top ten teams but has rallied for two consecutive wins against Stony Brook & Stanford. Liza Kelly put together an extremely tough schedule to prepare her Pioneers for a post-season run. While there are few moral victories in losing, DU’s talented, veteran team has shown that they can play with any of the Top 10 teams. The biggest surprise has been in scoring (11.12 GPG – Rank: 74/120 teams) which has been down. Expect goal scoring to increase in Big EAST play.
Denver’s Opponents in this week’s IWLCA Poll
at [3] Michigan – L, 8-4
[2] Maryland – L, 8-10
at [1] Northwestern – L, 10-14
at [14] Stony Brook – W, 8-7
[23] Stanford – W, 10-6
[20] Colorado – April 3
away [16] Yale – April 22
Denver women’s lacrosse has five players with nine or more goals. All everything Julia Gilbert leads the DU attack with 22 goals and 4 assists. Olivia Penoyer leads the team with 16 and has chipped in 12 goals. Lauren Black has 11 goals and 8 assists. The pink defense is real again this year, ranked eighth, and has kept them in every game. Goalkeeper Emelia Bohi has faced some excellent offenses and her save percentage is likely to rise (4.13 GPG – 62/105) once Big EAST play begins later this week against slightly weaker competition.
DU is a top team in caused turnovers and scoring defense. DU is poorly ranked (115/120) in free position, 60th in draw control and 51st in clearing percentage. These are three areas for improvement during the second half of the season. These are surprising statistics, especially since these have been historic strengths of Liza Kelly coached teams.
BIG EAST women’s lacrosse is not as strong as many other conferences (RPI) so Denver has little margin to slip up during conference play or sustain a BIG EAST Tournament upset or they could conceivably fall out of the NCAA Tournament. However, it is unlikely they will not make the NCAA Tournament considering the coaching and the roster depth. If they can get their offense going, that would take some of the pressure off of playing in low-scoring, tight games.
Denver women’s lacrosse starts conference play Sunday at noon MT against UConn and goes to Georgetown on the road the following Friday at 11:00 am MT. Smartly, Kelly has scheduled games against nationally ranked Colorado and Yale during the season to protect the team’s RPI. DU women’s lacrosse is fully capable of advancing to the final four (again) this season as we predicted earlier in the season and a national championship, their first, remains a real possibility.
Photo courtesy of Denver Athletics
The men’s team’s loss to Yale at home was a head-scratcher, and the DU’s poor stats this year on ground balls is perhaps fatal to this team if they cannot find a way to improve on it. In lacrosse, the groundball stat is reflective of the team effort level, and the coaching staff needs to find a way to get the guys to play harder, or wins against good teams will be very hard to come-by.
As for the women, the ‘pink hat’ defense is no longer a mystery this year, but being ranked #8 nationally now is very good and they could be great by year end with progress. That said, the offense is a disappointment, ranking 74th nationally in goals scored — very low for a team with aspirations to be a top 5 program. Of course, DU is playing much better teams this year, which explains a good chunk of the drop, but I expected much more from all the returning players, plus the addition of Penoyer and Earley. Free positions have been disastrous this season. If those can’t be fixed, there will be no NCAA tourney for the Pios.