BALTIMORE — In the months leading into his senior season, Loyola goalie Jacob Stover canvassed some former Greyhounds on how to approach his final year on campus.

He’d already played on the final weekend of the season. He had started for most of his first three seasons, moving into the lineup by March of his freshman season. There wasn’t much he hadn’t seen.

There was simplicity of the feedback: Be present and the enjoy the ride. It ensured he would take care to remember everything still to come.

“Every time you step on the field, you have to savor the moment,” Stover said. “You have to enjoy it and make the most of it. The pain of regret is something I’ve always thought about and has driven me throughout my career.”

There’s little doubt Stover has been present — and a presence — for the eighth-seeded Greyhounds (12-4), who will meet top-seeded Penn State (15-1) in Sunday’s NCAA tournament quarterfinals in East Hartford, Conn.

Stover ranks second in the country in save percentage at 59.4, and it is moments like his one-on-one stuff of Syracuse’s Jamie Trimboli early in the fourth quarter of Loyola’s 15-13 first-round victory Saturday that will live on in highlights after he departs the program after this season.

The telling part of Stover’s performance is far more routine. He has made at least 10 saves in every game this season, and will almost certainly have to hit that number again if the Greyhounds are to get past a potent Penn State offense keyed by Tewaaraton finalist Grant Ament and national goals leader Mac O’Keefe.

Stover’s streak actually began last year, when his 19-save showing in the NCAA quarterfinals was about the only thing to slow Yale on its charge to a national title. Loyola lost 8-5, but it would have been far more lopsided without Stover making at least four saves in every quarter.

And so through a lamentable result came the seeds of Loyola’s defensive plan for the following season: Light the Stove, and go from there.

“We talked about how we need the guy that finished ’18 to come in and be that guy all of ’19, knowing what we were graduating defensively,” coach Charley Toomey said. “He and Paul [Volante] were really the lone returners with some young short sticks and Ryan [McNulty] stepping into the starting [long pole] role. We were going to make mistakes defensively, and he was going to have to bail us out.”

So he did, from the start of the season. Toomey is aggressive in his nonconference schedule, and the Greyhounds played five NCAA tournament teams (Duke, Georgetown, Johns Hopkins, Towson and Virginia) among its six contests outside of the Patriot League. Stover stopped 18 shots in the opener against Virginia, matched that two weeks later against Rutgers and made 16 saves against Georgetown last month.

It hasn’t been a perfect season, but the steady Stover has yet to deliver a dud.

“He’s just remarkably consistent for a goalie,” Loyola defensive coordinator Matt Dwan said. “There’s not too many highs and lows for him. That’s not to say he can’t have an off game, but his level of producing the same type of confidence [is impressive]. As a young defense, that’s what they build off of to know if they make a mistake here and there, which is going to happen, that he can make that stop.”

The path to this point had some obvious bumps. Toomey yanked Stover a quarter into the 2016 NCAA semifinals after North Carolina bolted to a 9-2 lead. And at times as a sophomore, Stover acknowledged he would look to the sideline from time to time just in case Toomey was getting ready to give him a hook.

For the last two years, though, it’s been Stover’s defense to anchor. Last year, there were some veteran pieces like defenseman Foster Huggins around. This season, Stover’s voice has resonated more than anyone’s as the Greyhounds have tried to establish an identity at that end.

“He’s as fundamental as any goalie I’ve ever coached,” Toomey said. “I talked to him after his sophomore year: ‘I can’t take you further. I played the position and I think I know how to coach the position. You’ve got it. You’ve got all the intangibles. What you have to do your junior and senior years is settling down after the save and making the right decisions.’”

Perhaps the most fascinating change for Stover in the back half of his college career is a decreased reliance on film review. He still watches tape of opposing defenses, but more to understand ball movement and how his own teammates are likely to react.

But agonizing over whether an opponent prefers to shoot high or low? It’s no longer a priority, especially as Stover’s ability to anticipate a next move has evolved.

“As a goalie, you can’t think about the shot,” Stover said. “The only thing you can do is react and focus on seeing that ball. Because you’ve seen the shots. Any goalie at the Division I level and is able to play has seen hundreds of thousands of shots. So it’s about reacting, and when you react and focus on that, it allows you to play your best and be relaxed.”

He drew on the experience of getting beat earlier in Saturday’s game by Syracuse long pole Brett Kennedy to collect a shot in the third quarter. Then there was the stuff of Trimboli, when Stover plucked a point-blank shot to prevent Syracuse from interrupting Loyola’s rally and push its lead back to two.

Stover has provided breathing room for a defense with five new starters in front of him this season. And it’s been appreciated by a group that had given up 20 goals in its three games heading into the tournament.  

“It’s never a surprise,” freshman defenseman Cam Wyers said. “He’s always got our back. … I’ve never been on the side of a defense with a goalie that is that spectacular. Coming on and seeing a guy who’s willing to lay it on the line like that and make saves like that is incredible.”

The capper could be bookend trips to Memorial Day weekend. The Greyhounds were smothered in the first round at Ohio State two years ago, then stymied in the quarterfinals last year. Still, Stover has played in the postseason in all four seasons of his career.

How he handled the end of that first season — the blur of the loss to North Carolina loss — still sticks with him.

“Playing that final four game, I realized how fast that first quarter went,” Stover said. “That’s something that really struck reality with me because I only played 15 minutes of that game, and I said, ‘I wish I would’ve enjoyed that a little bit more.’”

Another postseason hook is unlikely. There’s a strong bond between coach and player and, more accurately, former goalie and current goalie.

“He doesn’t even look at the sideline,” Toomey said. “He knows. And he should. He’s our guy. I think that confidence that we have together allows him to sit and react and allows him to be a little more poised in the goal and make those plays.”

And, as he has all season, appreciating the opportunity the present provides.