Pennsylvania, ever the battleground state.
Big Ten runner-up Penn State earned the last at-large bid in the NCAA Division I men’s lacrosse tournament, leaving Ivy League runner-up Penn as the first team out of the 17-team field.
The selections were announced Sunday night on ESPNU. Notre Dame predictably received the No. 1 overall seed on the strength of one of the best NCAA tournament resumes in recent memory. The Fighting Irish finished with five top-five RPI wins after defeating Duke handily in the ACC championship game Sunday.
Duke got the No. 2 seed, followed by No. 3 Johns Hopkins, No. 4 Syracuse and No. 5 Denver. Virginia and Maryland both struggled down the stretch but had good enough metrics for the committee to slot them in as the No. 6 and No. 7 seeds, respectively.
Georgetown rounded out the seeded teams at No. 8. The Hoyas wrapped up their sixth straight Big East championship Saturday and have something no other team in the field can claim — a win over Notre Dame.
The ACC and Big Ten soaked up seven of the eight at-large selections. Consequently, seven teams that earned automatic qualifiers by winning their conference championships will be on the road for the first round of the NCAA tournament. That includes whoever wins the play-in game Wednesday between Albany and Sacred Heart.
For the second straight year, the biggest factors were Michigan and Princeton surging to win the Big Ten and Ivy League tournaments, respectively. Both were bid thieves of sorts, though Princeton’s dismantling of Yale and Penn this weekend put it on the precipice of a seed. The Ivy was a one-bid league.
ESPN will broadcast every game throughout the NCAA tournament. All first-round games will air live on ESPNU.
While Maryland will host Princeton in a rematch of a game won by the Terps back in February, the committee did lacrosse fans a favor with fresh matchups. Penn State will play Georgetown for the first time since 2009. Michigan heads to Denver for their first matchup since 2013.
There are several interesting subplots to Johns Hopkins’ game against Patriot League champion Lehigh. Not only will it be the first time the teams have played each other, but also Blue Jays offensive coordinator John Crawley recruited many of the Mountain Hawks’ current players when he held the same position in Bethlehem, ESPN analyst Paul Carcaterra noted during the selection show.
Moreover, if Lehigh were to spring the upset under first-year head coach Will Scudder and if Virginia thwarts Saint Joseph’s, the NCAA quarterfinal would pit the Mountain Hawks against their longtime head coach Kevin Cassese, now the offensive coordinator for the Cavaliers.
All eight NCAA tournament first-round matchups are listed below with day and start time (Eastern), as well as the quarterfinal sites to which the winners will advance.
NCAA DIVISION I MEN’S LACROSSE TOURNAMENT
Hempstead, N.Y.
(1) Notre Dame (12-1) vs. Albany (9-7) / Sacred Heart (13-4) – Sunday 5 p.m.
(8) Georgetown (12-3) vs. Penn State (11-4) – Sunday 2:30 p.m.
Towson, Md.
(5) Denver (11-3) vs. Michigan (10-6) – Saturday 5 p.m.
(4) Syracuse (11-5) vs. Towson (13-3) – Sunday 7:30 p.m.
Towson, Md.
(3) Johns Hopkins (10-4) vs. Lehigh (9-6) – Sunday 12 p.m.
(6) Virginia (10-5) vs. Saint Joseph’s (12-3) – Saturday 12 p.m.
Hempstead, N.Y.
(7) Maryland (8-5) vs. Princeton (11-4) – Saturday 7:30 p.m.
(2) Duke (12-5) vs. Utah (12-4) – Saturday 2:30 p.m.
