The field for the 2025 NCAA Men’s lacrosse tournament was announced Sunday, with the tournament set to begin with the play-in games on Wednesday.
As always, the tournament features some juicy storylines and tons of intriguing teams and players. I wanted to break down a few things I am watching in round one.
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I chose not to include it in the storylines, but CJ Kirst’s continued assault on the history books is certainly something for fans to monitor this tournament. Now at 68 goals and 30 assists, Kirst is nearly at 100 points without even playing a tournament game. The all-time single season goals record of 82 is in play, but Kirst will need to stay essentially on his current pace.
Another interesting one to watch is the combination of Kirst and Ryan Goldstein. Currently at 80 points and coming off a 15-point Ivy League tournament, Goldstein has a chance to hit 100 points himself. Only one set of teammates, Lyle and Miles Thompson, have both scored 100 points in the same season.
I also chose not to include Notre Dame’s quest for a three-peat. Obviously, this would put them in an incredible historical position, but this year’s Irish team is unseeded with major questions to answer. That’s not to say they don’t have a chance to win, nobody should be foolish enough to count them out. But we can cross the three-peat bridge closer to the final four.
Now lets get into five storylines to watch in the 2025 NCAA Men’s Lacrosse Tournament.
1. Who Wins the Rematches?
The first round of the 2025 NCAA Men’s Lacrosse Tournament will feature at least three regular season rematches and possibly four. Penn State will play Colgate for the second time, Harvard will make their second visit to the Dome this weekend and Notre Dame will head once again to Columbus to take on the Ohio State Buckeyes. If UAlbany can get by Siena in the play-in, they will head to Cornell for the second time this season.
Let’s start with Ohio State, who are probably the most frustrated of any team with how the bracket shook out. The RPI and numbers clearly favoured Princeton and Maryland over the Buckeyes, but that won’t stop OSU and their fans from wondering why they are behind a team they just beat.
Then they match up against a Notre Dame team that is looking for their aforementioned third straight title and is one of the most experienced groups in the country. Ohio State has been the better team this year, as evidenced by their 10-9 victory over the Irish in March. But it’s hard to beat a team twice, and though they won’t admit it, I am sure Nick Myers and his staff would have preferred a different draw.
Penn State began their season with a relatively dominant 14-9 victory over Colgate and will look to do the same this weekend. Of course, Colgate beat Penn State last year in a game that threatened to wreak havoc in PSU’s seeding for the 2024 tournament. Colgate will surely be recounting that game and trying to infuse their players with confidence that they can do it again.
Penn State is one of the best clearing teams in the nation and will hope to neutralize the second-ranked ride of Colgate that has been terrorizing teams (they forced 15 failed clears in three Patriot League tournament games). Having some film of themselves against that ride should help PSU.
Then Harvard will look for their second win of the season at the JMA Wireless Dome. They should bring a case of wine for the Syracuse staff, as Syracuse’s ACC tournament weekend elevated Harvard’s win and helped them get the nod over Army for the last tournament spot. Harvard beat Syracuse in part because of an off-day for Syracuse goaltender Jimmy McCool, a fact which is brought up often on Syracuse broadcasts.
If McCool can play better in this one, Syracuse should be able to punish a Harvard team that is one of the worst faceoff groups in the country.
2. Can Maryland Buck the Trend?
I wrote an article a few months back which looked at the national ranks of final four teams for a variety of statistical categories. The most important takeaway from the article was that offence is actually a more significant predictor of national champions and final four participants than defence was.
The lowest ranked offence by a national champion was the 2017 Maryland Terrapins, who finished with the nation’s tenth best offence. Defensively, several national champions were ranked well outside the top ten.
As of today, seven of the nation’s top offences are in the tournament. Cornell has the first spot, followed by Colgate (third), Siena (fifth), Harvard (sixth), Richmond (eighth), Notre Dame (ninth), and Syracuse (tenth). UNC, Princeton, Ohio State, Albany, and Penn State are all close to the top ten and could get there with a big tournament run.
But the more notable thing is the outlier: Maryland. The Terps have an extremely unusual statistical profile this season, as they sit 43rd in goals per game, but they have the 13th best shooting percentage (which is down a bit after 19 saves from Caleb Fyock in the Big Ten title game). The only logical takeaway is that Maryland doesn’t take a ton of shots, but when they do they get high quality looks. And they finish at an elite level.
It’s been a good strategy for the Terps, but will be an interesting test of historical data. Again, Maryland has time to rise up these rankings with a good tournament. But only two teams have made the final four with an offensive rank worse than 43rd.
They were the 2017 Towson Tigers and… the 2024 Maryland Terrapins. Make of that what you will.
3. Momentum is Fickle
One of the things I always find interesting about this time of year is the number of teams that go into the NCAA tournament off a loss. Of the seeded teams, just three (Cornell, Ohio State, Syracuse) won their last game. Penn State and UNC lost disappointingly in their semi-finals of the conference tournaments, as did Notre Dame and Harvard. Princeton, Maryland and Duke will all feel slightly better about their past weekends.
But momentum comes and goes. Just a week ago, Syracuse was fighting for their playoff lives and now they are the one with the juice heading into opening weekend.
On the flip side, Harvard had the biggest sweat to get in and you could tell by the relief on their players’ faces that the result was not a certainty. But can they regather themselves? Being that close to your metaphorical death can galvanize a team. But it can also bring a team to a mental place where their season is already over. Coming back from that can be tricky as well.
Then you have Notre Dame, who had to have been feeling good about their game, only to drop a playoff game to Syracuse. It was their first playoff loss in 10 games. Even with their incredible success over the last two tournaments, that loss has to shake your confidence.
For that reason, I think the first quarters of a lot of these games will be important. Can the teams who feel great find that swagger early? And can the teams who lost get back to their games quickly? That’s a major question.
4. Will Princeton Overcome Their Fatal Flaw?
The Princeton Tigers look the part of a title team, but they have a big, big problem. They are currently 57th in the country at the faceoff X, a number which puts incredible pressure on them to execute on both ends of the field.
It’s not impossible to win without an elite faceoff man. In 2023, Notre Dame won just 46.9% of their draws, the 49th best mark in the nation.
But no team has made the final four with a rank as bad as Princeton’s. And they aren’t the only team with that issue. Albany and Harvard are even worse, with the Crimson being one of the very worst faceoff teams in the country.
For the Tigers, this could derail an otherwise extremely talented and effective team. In their three losses, the Tigers lost the faceoff battle cumulatively 56-37, meaning they had 19 less possessions in those games than their opponents. That’s tough to overcome against good teams.
Luckily for the Tigers, the bracket looks ok for them. Towson is not an elite faceoff team, then the Tigers will surely hope for a Harvard upset over Syracuse. But either way, this is one of the biggest issues facing any of the contenders.
5. Will We Have an Upset This Weekend?
Last year, every seeded team won in the first round, with no upsets at all. In 2023 we saw number four Maryland fall in College Park to Army, and Michigan won at Cornell. In 2022, we all remember when Delaware took down Georgetown.
ARMY STRONG! 🗡 @ArmyWP_MLax takes down defending champions (4) Maryland, 15-14. #NCAAMLAX x 🎥 ESPNU / @ArmyWP_MLax pic.twitter.com/EvCs6EBA0j
— NCAA Lacrosse (@NCAALAX) May 14, 2023
It’s been a crazy year in college lacrosse, so it feels like we should see some upsets. Richmond and Notre Dame especially will be eager to take on their first round matchups, while Duke has looked shaky at times before a big surge late.
It feels like there are a few legitimate candidates, but who will it be?
Tune in to find out! The 2025 NCAA Men’s Lacrosse Tournament kicks off Wednesday!