There are myriad reasons to watch Saturday’s NCAA men’s lacrosse quarterfinal between Brown and Navy in Providence (2:30 p.m. ET, ESPNU). The subplots are many. The coaches, as often happens in the expanding but still fairly close-knit community of the sport, once worked together.
The programs are both hoping to return to Championship Weekend following lengthy absences. Brown hasn’t been to the semifinal round since 1994, and the Midshipmen haven’t been to the big stage since their appearance in the 2004 title game.
The matchup on the field features the timeless irresistible force vs. immovable object confrontation as the high-scoring Bears look to solve the stingy Navy defense. But the bottom line is that fast pace that Brown likes to dictate often makes for action-packed, end-to-end lacrosse that most spectators enjoy.
“That’s just who we are,” says Brown coach Lars Tiffany. “The phrase ‘Play our game’ is heard often here at Brown, in practice and also certainly pregame when the jitters are flowing. And our guys believe in it. That’s how they want to play. And it works. I mean, we’re not undefeated, but for the most part our guys trust the system.”
Tiffany readily admits that he has tried to build his program in the image of the high-flying Syracuse teams assembled by legendary coach Roy Simmons Jr. Those powerhouse Orange squads of the late 1980s and early ’90s weren’t afraid to push the ball in transition, and it wasn’t uncommon to see defenseman with long poles in the attack zone looking to shoot.
The Bears (15-2) have the numbers to back up that philosophy. They lead the country in scoring with an average of 16.76 goals a game, three more than any other Division I squad. Dylan Molloy, a finalist for the Tewaaraton Award, leads the country with 114 total points on 60 goals and 54 assists. But he gets plenty of help from his entire offensive unit, with fellow attackman Kylor Bellistri adding 58 goals and 26 helpers. The potent attack was on full display last week in a 17-8 dismantling of Johns Hopkins.
Then there’s Navy (11-4), which at first glance is in the quarterfinals because of its play on the defensive end of the field. The Midshipmen are second in the nation in scoring defense, allowing 7.13 goals per outing. It helps having steady senior John Connors, who has a 7.00 goals against average with a .556 save percentage, backing things up. He finished with 12 stops and was outstanding in the second half of last week’s 13-10 upset of fourth-seeded Yale.
But the first part of that score was just as encouraging for coach Rick Sowell. The 13-goal output seemed to snap the Midshipmen out of a scoring funk that set in after their hard-fought regular-season win at Army. The Mids managed only three goals in a rematch with the Black Knights in a Patriot League tournament semifinal loss that had them sweating for more than a week as they waited to see if they would appear on the NCAA bracket.
“We knew we were capable of scoring goals, if you look at our season as a whole,” Sowell says. “But the fact that we’re back on track offensively is certainly encouraging. We’re going to need to score goals on Saturday. This is not a game that’s going to be played in single digits. That’s just not going to happen.”
There isn’t much history between the schools, who haven’t squared off since Brown’s first-round NCAA tournament win in 1994 and only three times overall. But Sowell is more than familiar with the scenery around the Ivy League. His head coaching career began at Dartmouth, where Tiffany was on his staff.
“I learned a lot from Rick,” Tiffany says. “He motivates men better than most people. He gets the most out of his men.”
“He was a defensive player back when he played,” Sowell recalls of Tiffany.
“The idea of running up and down the field I’m not sure was something you’d have thought his teams would be doing 20 years later. But we all evolve. He’s a bright guy, so I’m sure he recognized the talent that he had and that he could play a different style.”
There’s one other interesting tidbit to this contest. Though the game is in Brown’s hometown as the predetermined host institution for this quarterfinal, it will not be at the Bears’ home field. It will instead be at Brown Stadium, the football facility with a natural grass surface that might require both teams to adjust.
“It’s kind of interesting. The crown on the field might have more of an impact than the grass,” Tiffany says. “Our facility people tell us our football field has a bigger crown than any in the Ivy League.
It might take us a while to figure out where to shoot if you’re, say, at a 45-degree angle from the cage It might make the goalie look bigger — like Randy Johnson up on the mound. But never fear. There should still be plenty of shots.
˃Saturday’s first quarterfinal in Providence between top-seeded Maryland and No. 8 Syracuse (noon ET, ESPNU) might seem better suited to a Final Four setting next week in Philadelphia. Many observers believed the Orange were underseeded when the bracket was unveiled, considering their strong performance in the Atlantic Coast Conference tournament. Though the Terrapins are doing a lot of things well themselves, Maryland coach John Tillman still has plenty of concerns.
“They just seem to be getting better and better,” he says of the Orange. “They have a great sense of self in terms of their offense. They are very organized. They are a team that puts guys in good spots. They are a little bit more deliberate than Syracuse teams of the past, but they are very smart.”
˃ The two games at the Sunday quarterfinal site in Columbus happen to be rematches. The first is an all-ACC affair as No. 3 Notre Dame looks to avenge a puzzling loss to North Carolina (noon ET, ESPNU). The Tar Heels staged an unforgettable comeback a month ago, erasing a five-goal deficit in the fourth quarter with seven unanswered goals to stun the Irish 17-15.
No. 7 Loyola and Towson (2:30 p.m. ET, ESPNU) will close out the round. It’s been a bit longer since those neighborhood rivals met. The Tigers earned a 10-8 win on Loyola’s home field back on March 2, but even then that was an indication they were capable of pulling off a result like last week’s upset of second-seeded and defending national champion Denver. The Greyhounds, however, were just as impressive in their first-round romp past Duke.
