SPARKS, Md. —The annual Team USA Fall Classic will be a lacrosse lover’s dream with the U.S. men’s and women’s national teams welcoming a Canadian men’s senior team and a Canadian women’s senior team and the reigning NCAA champions — Maryland (women) and Virginia (men) — to the event which will be held on the Oct. 18-20 weekend, which is also the annual induction weekend for the National Lacrosse Hall of Fame.

In addition, the USA Select U15 and U17 boys’ and girls’ teams named as part of the National Team Development Program (NTDP) will be playing teams from Ontario during the weekend.

“The Fall Classic will be unprecedented,” said Skip Lichtfuss, director of national teams and high performance at US Lacrosse. “The inclusion of the NTDP competition is especially meaningful. The opportunity for our prospective U. S. team high-schoolers to get a sense of the experience and an up-close feel alongside our current senior team will be integral in their development and aspirations.”

The U.S. and Canadian senior men’s and women’s teams have swept the gold and silver medals at every World Lacrosse championship dating back to 2010 and this year’s Fall Classic is a step towards expanding the competition between the two countries.

“We want to play USA more frequently than just once every four years,” said Jason Donville, director of high performance and international relations for the Canadian Lacrosse Association. “We want to get to an annual event. This is the first step.”

This year’s event also marks the second consecutive year the U.S. teams will match up against the reigning NCAA champions, and this year those teams will get the bonus opportunity of playing Canada as well.

The Maryland women’s program is known for reloading and will have to do so after losing its top three scorers and its Tewaaraton-winning goalie Megan Taylor.

“We have lots of spaces to fill, no doubt about that,” said Maryland head coach Cathy Reese. “It’s a great opportunity to compete against the best in the world, and we’ll use it as a learning experience.”

The Virginia men won their first championship since 2011 and return a talented offensive group, but have to replace a number of key contributors to their title run, most notably All-American midfielder Ryan Conrad.

“We’re incredibly fortunate to be able to play two elite international teams,” said head coach Lars Tiffany. “This will certainly be an immediate eye-opener of where we and how much we need to work on."

Complete schedule information for the Fall Classic will be announced in the near future.