Big Ten Lacrosse starts this week, with each team playing five games in five weeks vs the other five teams, followed by the Big Ten Tournament.
Maryland is undefeated and has been ranked #1 every week but the preseason, which had two time defending NC Virginia in the top spot. The Terps supplanted them week 1, and beat the snot out of them last weekend, so they are the team to beat. Rutgers and Ohio State are also ranked in the Top 20. Michigan and J Hopkins just fell out of the rankings this week. Penn State is really bad this year.
The main challengers to the Big Ten are as usual the ACC and the Ivy League. The Ivy has six ranked teams; everyone but Dartmouth. The ACC has four teams in the Top 20, every team but Syracuse. This may be the first time that J Hopkins and Syracuse have ever been simultaneously unranked in the entire history of the sport. They are the brightest of blue bloods.
The Patriot League contributes a trio of teams to the rankings, while the Big East has only a pair of ranked teams. The Colonial and SoCon each have one.
The new conference batting cleanup in the midwest/west launches this year, in the spirit of the old Great Western Lacrosse League. Robert Morris, Cleveland State, Detroit Mercy, Bellarmine KY, Air Force and Utah will join forces. "What is the name of the new conference?" you ask? Why, it is the "Atlantic Sun" of course. What else would you name a conference that contains most of the teams west of Pittsburgh?
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