Lax Factor Lacrosse Podcast

Jeff Teat put the league on notice letting everyone know, he didn't just come for the PLL Rookie of the Year award, but he may be eyeing that MVP as well. Teat went off for 4 goals and 4 assists in the Atlas' win over the Chaos Saturday evening.

The Waterdogs put the beat down on the Cannons, Ryan Brown going for 4 goals in the win, and the Redwoods topped the Whipsnakes thanks to 4 goals from Matt Kavanaugh, and Tim Troutner Jr. standing on his head in cage, 17 saves on the day for Troutner.

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We are seeing that trend of "the teams that play Friday and Sunday back to back end up gassed by Sunday", and this weekend was no different as we saw the "rested" teams both win out this weekend.

It started with the Matt Rambo-less Whipsnakes taking down the Archers by a single goal, Jay Carlson sticking the game winner on a feed from John Haus. Sunday's action continued as the Atlas defeated the Chrome by six goals thanks to the Atlas midfield going off. Bryan Costabile (6 points, 4 goals w/ a deuce and an assist) and Romar Dennis (5 points, 3 goals w/ a deuce, and an assist) both had huge games in leading the Atlas over the Chrome.

We'll talk about how SSDM's are having big years in the PLL, guys worth mentioning, Danny Logan (Atlas), Ryan Terefenko (Chrome) and Matt Abbott (Whipsnakes) all had huge weekends all over the field playing well on defense, between the boxes and even on offense. It's a trend I feel like we're seeing more than in the previous two seasons of PLL action and it's one I hope continues.

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The Chaos started the season with two straight losses and things looked rough for them with the Whipsnakes and the Archers up next. Instead of folding and starting 0-4, the Chaos decided to upset the two best teams in the league in back-to-back games. They held the Archers to their lowest scoring output in team history winning this one 8-7 on Friday night. John Galloway played tough in cage for the Chaos putting up 13 saves in the win. Colin Heacock scored 4 goals on the day including the game winner in the fourth quarter.

The Redwoods and Waterdogs blew the over/under out of the water on Saturday seeing each team score 10 first half goals. Both teams starting goalies found the bench at some point in the second half, and it was Jack Kelly getting the W in cage for the Redwoods, a great story. Kelly tore his ACL in 2018 during the World Games and this was his first action since the injury. Sergio Perkovic lead all scores in this game with 8 points off 4 goals and 2 assists (including two 2-point goals).

The Cannon's may have lost to the Chaos on Saturday, but on the bright side, Paul Rabil is now professional lacrosse's (the field version) all time points leader again thanks to his 3 goal, 3 assist effort. Alas, the Chaos played the better game and pulled out the win. Josh Byrne went for 2 goals and 3 helpers in the win, and rookie's Ryan Smith and Mac O'Keefe each put up 4 points.

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I'm from Upstate NY so I'm naturally a big Connor Fields fan. When he found himself on the bench last season I couldn't believe it as the Chaos thrived without him. So in this episode I'm going to dive into the PLL stats a bit to see how this could happen. How could one of the most skilled attack on planet earth have trouble getting on the field in the Premier Lacrosse League.

As part, we'll also talk about some geezers in the league that struggled in 2020, but have been playing really tough in 2021, Paul Rabil and Rob Pannell. Both put up stinkers last year, but have been incredible so far this season.

We'll also talk about a few PLL rookies.  I'll quickly profile Mac O'Keefe (Penn State), Jeff Teat (Cornell) and Jake Carroway (Georgetown). All three were highly touted and each has had a measure of success thus far in 2021.

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Matt Rambo proved yet again that he's the best lacrosse player in the world by scoring the OT game winner for the Whipsnakes against the Atlas on Friday night. We also got to see the debut of Jeff Teat, the Cornell attackman that lost two college lacrosse seasons to covid stepped onto a lacrosse field for the first time in 400+ days and he ended up with 2 assists.

Rambo finished the day with 3 goals and 2 assists in the victory and teammate Jay Carlson came up with a game saving takeaway on a clear in OT that resulted in the Rambo game winner.  Carlson also put up 2 goals.

It was Mac O'Keefe sniping a two-pointer from the top middle of the field which ended up being the game winner for the Chaos over the Redwoods. O'Keefe finished the game with 3 points off 2 goals (including that game winning two-pointer). Jake Froccaro paced the Chaos with 4 assists.

Grant Ament and the Archers walked to victory on Saturday night thanks to Ament's 1 goal and 5 helpers mixed with the Waterdogs playing like trash. Will Manny put up 3 goals and 2 assists for the Archers and Marcus Holman and Tom Schreiber each put up 4 points in the win.

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OK, so news first, Gary Gait, Syracuse's new head coach, only the 5th in the programs history, wasted no time making headlines in hiring Dave Pietramala, former adversary, and long time head coach at Cuse rival Johns Hopkins. Pietramala is one of the most storied players and coaches in the game. Largely considered the greatest defensive lacrosse player in the history of the sport, Petro has won national titles as both a player at Hopkins and as a coach (2005 and 2007). So this hire is huge news.

Potentially huge because it's possible both of Pietramala's sons could end up ditching North Carolina for Syracuse as well now that this change has been made. My sources are telling me it's pretty much a done deal, but we'll see.

And it's also time to put the 2021 NCAA season to rest with our end of the year player awards, so here is the "LaxFactor All NCAA Lacrosse Squad" as well as my player of the year awards...

Attack

Midfield

SSDM

LSM

Specialist

Defense

Goalie

Rookie Of The Year

Breakout Player Of The Year

LaxFactor Biggest Balls Of Them All Awards

Virginia won an instant classic over Maryland by a score of 17-16 capturing their second national title in a row, the first back to back championship in the programs history. Connor Shellenberger was a huge part of the win going for 4 goals and 2 assists. The redshirt freshman was too much for Maryland to handle all day long. Teammate Matt Moore also put up 4 goals and 2 helpers in the win, both players taking only 7 shots. That efficiency in scoring would prove key down the stretch as Maryland turned up the heat defensively and started to battle back late.

UVA Keeper Alex Rode and the Cavaliers defense played an excellent game, outplaying their counterparts for the Terps just enough to squeak out the win. Rode's last second save to seal the victory will go down in Virginia history as one of the biggest moments of all time.

Tewaaraton winner Jared Bernhardt was held to 2 goals and 3 assists, an excellent outing to be sure, but a touch off of his season average. Petey LaSalla won the lions share of face-offs for the Cav's, but the Terps forcing turnovers between the boxes evened out that possession battle, and allowed Maryland to keep pace right down to the end of the game.

In other news, Gary Gait was named Syracuse's 5th lacrosse coach in over 100 years as John Desko decided to retire while I was walking around Magic Kingdom. The transition should be as smooth as coaching changes can go with Desko offering to help out in any way he can, and Gait obviously accepting his former coach's offer.

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Memorial Day Weekend is upon us, the most beloved weekend of the year by lacrosse fans all over the world. We have the top four seeds in the tournament doing battle this weekend so it's sure to be exciting.

In Saturday's first game we have #4 Virginia taking on #1 North Carolina.  Carolina beat the Cavs in their first meeting, but UVA retunred the favor and dropped the Heels in their second. So this is sure to be a dogfight.

In the second game on Saturday, we'll see the ACC vs Big Ten battle take place with #3 Maryland taking on #2 Duke. These teams only have Notre Dame as like opponents at this point and the outcomes prove, another dogfight will be happening here.

For my picks, I'm taking Virginia over UNC and Duke over Maryland, so I predict we'll see a Virginia vs Duke final, but who knows.  I suck a predictions.

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Maryland made sure the NCAA Lacrosse Final Four wasn't an all ACC affair by knocking off Notre Dame in overtime on Sunday. We had three incredible lacrosse games that saw Duke and North Carolina also advance thanks to winning in overtime. One of the best quarterfinal weekends in memory.

For Maryland, Notre Dame gave them all they could handle, but Jared Bernhardt's 5 goals were too much to overcome and after dominating face-offs all day, Notre Dame lost the opening face-off of overtime and never ended up seeing the ball as Anthony Demaio stuck the game winner off the very first dodge of overtime.

Duke's overtime thriller against Loyola was also a great treat. Loyola played as well defensively as any team that faced Duke all year and Sam Schafer did a great job in cage, but in the end, it was Joe Robertson sticking yet another game winner for Duke in overtime to survive and advance.

Rutgers needed a perfect game out of their defense win against North Carolina and they very nearly got it. The Scarlet Knights were a couple of turnovers away from pulling the upset, but alas, the better team was able to force overtime and win which is what great teams do.

Virginia and Georgetown?  An absolute bloodbath.

So we have three ACC teams and a Big Ten team in the final four next weekend.

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We had some incredible games for this weekends first round NCAA Lacrosse Tournament action. To summarize, we saw Drexel give Notre Dame some trouble, losing 10-8 to the Irish in a game that came down to the final minutes. We saw Vermont lose by a margin to Maryland, but it was a respectable 17-11 margin.

Loyola and Denver played the game of the weekend with Loyola's Same Shafer making the game saving save with 4 seconds left on the clock. Michael Sowers trashed on High Point in the first half going for 8 points off 4 goals and 4 assists in Duke's 16-10 win. North Carolina handled their business against Monmouth, but even in a 16-4 loss, I felt Monmouth played tough lacrosse through that game.

Rutgers proved the B1G was tougher than many ACC fanboys thought in defeating Lehigh pretty easily, 12-5. Bryant kept pace with Virginia losing 13-11 and Syracuse got waxed by Georgetown 18-8, a terrible low point for my Orange.

We'll talk about every game in detail, pepper in some highlights for the first 3 or 4 games that I talk about, and we'll rinse and repeat next week and do it again on Monday.

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