Salisbury is no stranger to losing great players. You would expect a program that has won 12 national championships and 21 conference titles to have a good problem such as that.

But even Jim Berkman knew it would be tough heading into 2019. Gone were starting defensemen Will Nowesnick and Kyle Tucker, both of whom were drafted into Major League Lacrosse. Also departed were short-stick defensive midfielders Troy Miller, a first-team All-CAC selection, and Jeremiah LaClair.

The solution?

“We haven’t reinvented the wheel at all,” Berkman said. “We’re still playing the schemes we’re used to playing in. We put the players in who have been working really hard and earned their time.”

In other words, it’s next man up for Salisbury, which is off to a 3-0 start and allowing just 6.33 goals per game ahead of Saturday’s top-10 matchup with Gettysburg.

To fill the gaps left behind by Tucker and Nowensick, the Sea Gulls have turned to sophomores Noah Kness and Brad Apgar. The plug-ins at short-stick midfield are Parker Stevens, a senior, and Brad Greik, a junior.

The unit starts looking pretty solid, Berkman said, when tossing in top returning defenseman Drew Borkowicz (18 starts last year), junior transfer Riley Ford at short stick and long-stick midfielder Kevin Murphy, also a first-team All-CAC pick last spring.

“You take a hit when you lose guys like that,” Berkman said. “At the same token, we’ve been built with good depth and the idea that it’s always the next man up. We knew there would be some young guys, and it’d be a similar scenario to when Kyle and Will were sophomores. They got their opportunity and led us to a championship.”

Repeating such fortunes won’t come easy, though Salisbury has plenty of motivation after losing to Wesleyan in the NCAA championship game last spring. It also helps that junior goalkeeper Brandon Warren is back as the new-look defense takes form. Through three games, Warren has a 68.6 save percentage.

“We’ve been giving up shots the goalies can save,” Berkman said. “I can live with that. We’ve gotten people to places we want to, and they don’t have the best shooting angles. Brandon’s made several big saves and done a really nice job.”

Can Salisbury’s defense hold up? We’ll know a lot more after this three-game stretch against Gettysburg, Ohio Wesleyan and Stevenson.

Not to time to worry, McCabe insists

From afar, Washington and Lee’s 1-2 start might seem concerning.

But head coach Gene McCabe insists there’s optimism following one-goal losses at York and Denison. Those results bookended a 14-7 win over Christopher Newport, another program penciled high in the preseason rankings.

“At the end of the day, we were right there with two top-10 teams on the road, no less,” McCabe said. “You want to get those wins, and we had chances to, but we’re optimistic and learn from every win and loss. It’s still very early in the season, and there’s a thought-out reason for why we have this sort of non-conference schedule.”

Those losses also came during midterms, McCabe said. Even now, ahead of Saturday’s trip to Washington College, the Generals find themselves on vacation during their winter term, which runs from Jan. 7 to April 12.

That all lends McCabe to feel it’s certainly not time to panic, not when the program has made three NCAA tournaments this decade and routinely challenges for the ODAC title.

“We’ll be in these situations again and hopefully get over the hump,” McCabe said.

To do so, a big junior year will be required from faceoff specialist Jack Hodgson. McCabe wagered that Hodgson has first-team All-American potential, while short-stick midfielder Jed Londrey can sometimes be overlooked. Sophomore goalie Jack Taylor also is coming alongside nicely, with a whopping 16 saves in the York loss.

However, a great deal rides on the shoulders of senior attackman A.J. Witherell, a wo-time ODAC Player of the Year and All-American. Those honors, alongside 241 career points, often means Witherell finds himself double-teamed or being face-guarded.

Still, Witherell has found a way with seven points and could get Washington and Lee out of its mini funk.

“He’s always been a team-first guy and he still is today,” McCabe said. “The success has never gotten to his head. The attention, it’s been good for him because it’s challenged his game in finding different ways to be successful. The little thing he does, those are equally as dangerous.”

Year Five for Coast Guard

Three days removed from Coast Guard’s 10-1 opening win over Elizabethtown, head coach Ray LaForte was in a reflective mood.

He pointed back to the Bears’ first game as a varsity program, a 19-9 loss to their archrival, the Merchant Marine Academy. In year five as a program, the times have changed.

“We had a big blizzard that winter,” LaForte recalled. “We never got the field plowed and the snow stuck around, so we didn’t have one practice on a full field before our first varsity game. You go full circle, it snowed this past Tuesday, we shut down school and cancelled a scrimmage with UMass Boston. We end up scrimmaging the next day, didn’t miss a beat. Five yearslater, we’ve taken in the growing pains and now we’re pretty oiled up.”

Even more impressive, the result came without honorable mention All-American midfielder Riley McNulty. The junior was injured  in a scrimmage against Division I Hartford and was held out as a precaution, Laforte said. McNulty is day-to-day.

Unsurprisingly, honorable mention All-American goalie Trey Johnson was stellar against Elizabethtown, making 13 saves against the back-to-back Landmark Conference champions. With a deeper, more experienced roster, LaForte is optimistic about where his program is heading.

“These kids have played a lot of lacrosse,” LaForte said. “Now the dynamic is starting to hit us that the younger guys have been heavily recruited and are as good as seniors. So now this competition shows up in practice in even bigger ways.”

To reach the top, Coast Guard must wrangle NEWMAC supremacy from Springfield. The Pride, under head coach Keith Bugbee, have won 10 straight conference tournaments.

Coast Guard has chipped away at that, winning a one-goal game at Springfield in 2017. Last year, they also downed Wesleyan, the eventual NCAA champion, at home

“The top half of the league is really good,” LaForte said. “Coast Guard getting good at lacrosse, maybe it put the fire in the rest of the league. We might be on the verge of a second bid in the tournament. The whole thing is trending up.”

PHOTO COURTESY OF YORK ATHLETICS

Rather than returning home for this past Christmas break, Brendan McGrath spent most of it in York, Pa. He has a job in town, but also spent time at York College’s training facilities, regaining some strength and confidence.

The reason? Last year, the attackman tore his ACL the Monday leading up to a mid-season game against Salisbury. With 28 points through eight games, the then-junior’s season was done.\

“When he went down last year, my thought was we can score goals, but his riding was something we’d miss,” Spartans head coach Brandon Childs said. “Having him back on the defensive game has been awesome. Then he’s just such a good goal scorer, so to have someone with his shooting percentage and the knack to put the ball in the cage is huge.”

Bac k healthy for his senior year on the Conehead Line with classmates Hunter Davis and Thomas Pfeiffer, McGrath already has nine goals and two assists through two games.

Childs said McGrath still has another level or two to go until he reaches his potential. During his sophomore season, that was enough to produce second-team All-American and first-team All-CAC nods.

As McGrath progresses, Childs hopes his team does as well. At 2-0, he said they’re far from the finished product.

“I felt like on this day last year, at least on the offensive end, we knew our identity and had everything figured out,” Childs said. “We’re still working hard to come together on that end. Defensively, we’e pretty good and pretty organized, but as you noted, our schedule will challenge us. You can only play good defense for so long. Good teams will expose you.”