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Each year, we at US Lacrosse Magazine pore over the top coaches, players, games, performances, breakthroughs and moments for the annual “Best of Lacrosse” edition. Naturally, this retrospective tome drops in December. 

But now is the time to be heard.

We’re polling fans on Twitter (@USLacrosseMag) to vote on four finalists in 10 categories: Best Men’s Coach, Best Women’s Coach, Best Men’s Player, Best Women’s Player, Best Game, Best Men’s Performance, Best Women’s Performance, Best Men’s Breakthrough, Best Women’s Breakthrough and Best Moment.

Today, we present our four finalists for Best Men’s Breakthrough of 2017: Josh Byrne (Chesapeake Bayhawks), Tom Schreiber (Toronto Rock), Michael Sowers (Princeton) and Jeff Teat (Cornell).

The natural inclination in this category is to look at college freshmen and pro rookies, but we would be remiss not to mention someone like Ohio State’s Ben Randall, a good (second-team all-conference) player at Stony Brook who really emerged as one of the top cover defensemen in the country as a transfer for the Buckeyes. The Mason, Ohio, native became Ohio State’s first-ever first-team All-American, notably blunting Tewaaraton finalist Pat Spencer (1-for-6) in the Buckeyes’ NCAA tournament first-round win over Loyola. Other Breakthrough candidates included several college freshman who made big splashes in 2017, like Albany’s TD Ierlan (No. 2 nationally with 70.8 faceoff win percentage), Ohio State’s Tre LeClaire (school freshman-record 49 goals), Penn State’s Mac O'Keefe (school-record 51 goals), Denver’s Ethan Wlaker (school freshman-record 72 points) and Maryland’s Jared Bernhardt (third-team All-American).

Cases could be made for any and all of these standouts. More on this year’s finalists for Best Men’s Breakthrough:

Josh Byrne
Chesapeake Bayhawks

Byrne set MLL on fire with a league rookie-record 39 goals in just nine games, leading all players in the category despite playing four fewer games than No. 2 Michael Booklet (37G). The MLL Rookie of the Year went on to become the No. 1 overall pick in the NLL draft.

Tom Schreiber
Toronto Rock

In his first-ever season of box lacrosse, the reigning MLL MVP became the NLL Rookie of the Year while leading the Rock to the playoffs and setting la eague rookie record with 61 assists.

Michael Sowers
Princeton

The third-team All-American set the school’s single-season scoring record with 82 points (41G, 41A) as a freshman and ranked third nationally in points per game (5.47).

Jeff Teat
Cornell

After a slow start, the honorable mention All-American went on a tear, setting a school freshman single-season scoring record with 72 points (33G, 39A) and ranking second nationally in points per game (5.54). Notably, Teat outdueled Sowers with 12 points (5G, 7A) in the Big Red’s upset of the Tigers.