Canadians In The NCAA

Canadians in the NCAA is a weekly series published every Monday. Find all editions of the series here.

For a small minority of readers, this article may contain some nostalgia. For others, I hope this is the beginning of a new weekly tradition.

More than a decade ago, my father Jason Donville began a passion project. Mostly out of curiosity, he began to track how many Canadians were playing lacrosse in the NCAA. He did it the old fashioned way, by visiting the website of every team in college lacrosse, no matter what division, and kept a spreadsheet of it all.

Then every week, he would email his findings to an email list that grew as time went on, and came to include several high profile college coaches. Simply put, nobody was tracking the information, so my dad filled an unexplored niche in the reporting market.

Some of the articles were eventually included on sites like Inside Lacrosse, like this one from April 9th, 2009 (hint: Jay Card was “on fuego!”). 

I have decided to dust off my dad’s idea and carry the torch for a while. Thankfully, I learned the basics of data scraping in college, so I shouldn’t be spending much time scrolling websites.

Every Monday, I will post a check in of how our Canadians are doing down south. While this will eventually expand to include multiple divisions and women’s Division I, it will strictly be men’s Division I lacrosse to start.

For the first installation, let’s take a retrospective look at the 2023 season. 

Since my dad put down his pen, the Canadian explosion in lacrosse has continued. In the above linked article from 2009, there were 152 total men and women playing across all three levels of college lacrosse, as well as MCLA. In 2023, 184 Men took the field in Division I alone. Here is the list of every Division I men’s player from Canada, sorted by total points. 

Ontario led the way with 127 players, while British Columbia had 39, Alberta 15, Quebec chipped in 2 players, and Manitoba had one. 

The Canadians represented roughly 63 municipalities across the country. Toronto had the most with 22 players, followed by Oakville at 15, Victoria at 13, Burlington at 10, and Calgary at nine.

Obviously there are differences across different regions of the country which impact these results. While players from different parts of Toronto represent different minor and junior centers, players from different towns (i.e Oshawa and Whitby) may grow up playing for the same center. 

The chart below shows the top 15 hometowns in terms of the number of division I men's lacrosse players.

At least one thing is consistent from when my dad authored this series: Canadians still know how to score. While the 181 Canucks make up 6% of the total players in the NCAA, the 1,457 goals they scored make up nearly 11% of all goals scored last season.

When filtering by position, the numbers are less drastic, but still show that Canadians contribute more than their share of goals. Canadians compromised 7.4% of offensive players across the country, but contributed 11% of the goals scored by offensive players.

In fact, Alberta has the highest number of goals scored per player of any other province or US State.

In other words, Canadians still deliver on the offensive end. 

Efficiency continues to be a strength of the Canadian players as well. Amongst offensive players, the national average for shooting percentage is 29.8%, while the Canadians steer well clear of that figure at 33.6%. The average for Americans (without the Canucks added) was 29.4%. 

The Canadian Legion was led by four of the top 15 goal scorers in the nation. Duke’s Dyson Williams (Oshawa, Ontario) potted 60 goals to lead the pack, and would go on to contribute significantly for Team Canada at the world championships.

Ironically, in my dad’s article linked above, Zack Greer was the leading scorer amongst Canadians during his fifth year at Bryant. During his previous four years, Greer re-wrote the record books at Duke.

If Williams can repeat his performance from last season alongside Tewaaraton winner Brennan O’Neill, he will break Greer’s mark for goals at Duke, and may just eclipse Justin Guterding’s Duke record as well. Guterding broke Greer’s record and became the all-time NCAA leader in goals, only to have his NCAA record broken by Mac O’Keefe. With a big year, Williams can put himself in elite company.

Unfortunately for Williams, O’Neill might break the records around the same time. It should be an explosive spring in Durham. 

Second in goals last year and leading the Canadians in points was Tye Kurtz (Puslinch, Ontario) of the Delaware Blue Hens. Kurtz finished the year second nationally in total points, with 58 goals and 30 assists. Kurtz, who is lighting it up for the Albany Firewolves in the NLL, had a dominant spring.

Payton Cormier (Oakville, Ontario) scored 52 goals for the Virginia Cavaliers, and was joined by Carter Page (Peterborough, Ontario) in the top 15. Page chipped in 47 goals for Saint Joseph’s.

Meanwhile in the midfield, Thomas McConvey (Toronto, Ontario) scored 52 points en route to being named the outstanding midfielder of the entire country.

DEFENSIVE EVOLUTION

Goals are an easy statistic to cherry pick, but they do not encapsulate the scope of Canadian participation in division I. Of the 184 Canadian players, 24 were listed as defensemen, two as defensive midfielders, seven as long stick midfielders, two as face off men, and five as goaltenders.

This represents tremendous growth, especially amongst goaltenders, which speaks to the development of the Canadian field lacrosse ecosystem. 

In the Canadian tradition, and following my dad’s lead, this article will refer to “ground balls” as “loosies,” (for the uninitiated, this is short for “loose ball” which is the Canadian term, pretty cool eh?)

Of the 33 defensive players at the Division 1 level, Canadians picked up 488 loosies and caused 257 turnovers. Leading the way for the defensive brigade was first team All-American Owen Grant (Newmarket, Ontario), who had 57 loosies and 38 caused turnovers to go along with 10 points from the close defense position while playing at Delaware.

Jake Saunders (Oakville, Ontario) caused 35 turnovers and picked up 58 loosies for the Richmond Spiders, while Mitchell Dunham (Hamilton, Ontario) led all Canadians with 75 loosies to go with his 32 caused turnovers for Mount St. Mary’s. Rounding out the top five was Cam Wyers (Ottawa, Ontario) of Loyola who caused 22 turnovers along with his 31 loosies, and Hayden Thompson (Oakville, Ontario), who caused 18 turnovers along with 13 loosies for Queen’s University Charlotte.

As the data shows, there are difference makers for Canada across the board who impact winning at a high level.

Stay tuned for more insights all season long and follow your favourite players as they progress through their careers.