Good morning. Here’s the latest from around the lacrosse world:

1. Ally Kennedy is the US Lacrosse Magazine Division I Women’s Preseason Player of the Year.

Continuing our preseason awards coverage, we named the Stony Brook women’s midfielder the top player in the women’s game heading into the 2021 spring season. She was a likely Tewaaraton finalist before the COVID-19 pandemic wiped out the remainder of the 2020 season.

Kennedy also earned the cover nod for the January edition.

 

 

 

 

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Kennedy ranks second in Seawolves history in draw controls (242), fourth in goals (193), fifth in points (248) fifth in ground balls (133) and 10^th in assists (55).

2. On the men’s side, Michael Sowers is the Division I Preseason Player of the Year.

Sowers took the lacrosse world by storm in 2020, accumulating 47 points in only five games. Now with Duke after transferring from Princeton, the attackman is 98 points shy of tying Lyle Thompson for the all-time Division I points record. He’s also 50 assists away from tying Pat Spencer for the all-time D-I mark.

Read more here.

3. Jared Bernhardt is back in College Park.

The All-American attackman is back at Maryland after COVID-19 dashed his dreams of playing college football at Division II powerhouse Ferris State.

Bernhardt, already a program great, will further climb the Terps’ record book if the team plays a reasonably normal schedule.

More here.

WHAT WE’RE READING

• Yesterday, we started rolling out our writers’ favorite feature stories they worked on this year. First up, Nelson Rice’s story on Zed Williams winning PLL MVP and Matt Hamilton’s work talking to Drew Bledsoe for NFL #LaxDads. Check out the Twitter thread, which will be updated throughout the week, here.

• True Lacrosse has joined the boys’ lineup at US Lacrosse Youth Nationals.

• Help give the gift of lacrosse. All gifts to US Lacrosse during the final week of 2020 will be tripled thanks to a generous donor. Learn more here.

• Tanner Demling of Lacrosse Bucket highlights the top uncommitted prospects from the Class of 2022. 

WHAT WE’RE WATCHING

Craving lacrosse highlights? Let’s check in with Stony Brook for some of Ally Kennedy’s best work.

Can’t wait to see this one tear it up in 2021@ally_kennedyx is your @USLacrosseMag https://t.co/8dqoMk0Z4W#BelieveInTheSeawolves pic.twitter.com/LhJe7oSBk8

— Stony Brook WLAX (@StonyBrookWLAX) December 28, 2020

WHAT’S ON TAP

• Get ready for the Division II Preseason Players of the Year and Division II All-Americans.

• We're also rolling out some of our favorite stories of 2020, as told by our writers.

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