It was a breakthrough year for the B1G with every school being in the top 20 at some point or another this season. But you’re a smacked ass if you think that college lacrosse still doesn’t belong to the ACC. It’s still the best conference in the game and it will always be that way. And tonight, we have both ACC semifinal matchups coming from Durham. #1 seed Syracuse has #4 seed UNC at 6 and then it’s #2 Duke vs #3 Notre Dame at 8:30. Virginia still hasn’t won an ACC game since Bruce Jenner was still a dude so they’ll play in the showcase game against Penn tomorrow. We’ll get more into the match ups in a bit after we take a look at the rankings but just know that Cuse has won the last 2 ACC tournaments. Last year as a 4-seed and in 2015 as the 3-seed. This time they go into the tournament as the #1 overall team in the country after barely squeaking by Binghamton to keep that top spot in the rankings.

Rankings

Doesn’t matter if they’re playing Hopkins or Duke or Albany or fucking Binghamton. Cardiac Cuse is going to live and (possibly) die by the 1-goal game. Denver has been able to coast through their Big East schedule so don’t expect to see them lose again until we get to the actual tournament. I still think their lack of versatility offensively got exposed against Ohio State but when you have Trevor Baptiste as the faceoff X and get to play make-it-take-it all the time, that’s a decent recipe for success. Speaking of Ohio State, they got a huge overtime win over Maryland so now there’s 3 teams in the B1G with just 1 conference loss. That tournament is coming up next week. Albany finally got a big non-conference win they’ve been looking for, Loyola knocked off Army to take the #1 seed in the Patriot tournament and UNC lost yet another Top 20 game. For those of you keeping track at home, they’ve lost to Hopkins, Hofstra, Richmond, Maryland, Duke, Syracuse and Notre Dame. None of those are “bad” losses but their only good win has been against Denver. I don’t care how tough your schedule is. When you win the National Championship and then come out the next year at 6-7, you shouldn’t be in the conversation. It’s going to drive me up a fucking wall when they end up in the tournament because somehow they kick shit into gear and win the ACC tournament.

Anyway… on to the games this weekend.

What’s On Tap?

Patriot League Semis:

#14 Army vs #19 Boston | Today, 4:30pm | Line: Army -1

Fucking Army, man. I decided to hop on the bandwagon real quick and then they drop back-to-back PL games to Navy and Loyola. Their only loss on the season before that was to Rutgers in February. Then they let Navy comeback to beat them 10-6 and then get waxed by Loyola 14-6. It’d be one thing if these were 1/2 goal games but they just haven’t been able to get any offense going the past couple of weeks. That’s 2 bad losses in a row and now they have BU who just won their first ever post-season game against Lehigh on Tuesday in the quarterfinals. Army and BU played on April 8 and it was Cole Johnson with the game winner to give Army the 11-10 W.

But neither team was up by more than 2 goals at any point in that game. In their last 4 games, BU has put up 10, 12, 12, and 10 goals. Both 12-goal games were overtime winners against Loyola and Holy Cross. So yeah, if Army’s offense is still MIA then BU goes on to the Patriot League Championship game. I think this game goes 11-10 again but I’m so wary about betting on Army that I have no idea who I’d put my money on.

UPDATE: I’ll sack up and say Army gets it done since I love the Troops. But if they drop this one then what a wasted season that has become.

#17 Loyola vs Holy Cross | Tonight, 7:30pm | Line: Loyola -3.5

Pat Spencer has been getting his points this year. I don’t think anybody thought that wouldn’t be the case. He’s 3rd in the nation with 71 points off of 25 goals and 46 assists. Very few players in the country are able to create as much as he does. I’ve said this last year about him and I’ll say it again. A kid like Spencer is impossible to play against because he has the ability to take your ass to the goal if nobody slides to him. But if you slide, he immediately finds the open man and it ends up in the back of the goal. He and Sowers are the 2 best attackmen in the country at punishing you for sliding early. The rest of the Loyola team has just looked a little lost this season. You don’t expect to see a team who was playing Championship Weekend come out and drop games to Bucknell and BU the next season. But they looked good against Army last week and maybe they can get hot at the right time. They beat Holy Cross 16-9 earlier this season so tonight’s game shouldn’t be an issue. But the only way they end up in the NCAA tournament is if they win the Patriot so it’ll be good to see what they look like when the season is on the line. But yeah, Hounds by 4-5 tonight.

ACC Semis: 

#4 Duke vs #6 Notre Dame | Tonight, 8:30pm | Line: Notre Dame -1

I’m not entirely sure what to make out of this line. Last time these two played was April 8 and Duke got the 11-8 win. That was also after Notre Dame had just lost to Syracuse the week before. Since then they barely got by Marquette 11-10 and got another 1-goal win against North Carolina last weekend. Though this Bobby Gray goal should have counted for 2.

Now Duke also lost to Syracuse by 1 and their loss to Denver earlier in the year was much worse than Notre Dame’s 1-goal loss. But you have to keep in mind that was February Duke. Duke is always trash in the first month of the season. And since that February loss to Denver, the Cuse game has been their only loss. They got UNC by 4, Notre Dame by 3, and Virginia by 9. Justin Guterding is #2 in the nation with 72 points. Jack Bruckner is up in the top 20. Both of them have 40 goals on the season and both of them are Tewaaraton finalists. Mix that all in with the fact that Duke is hosting the tournament so this is a home game for them, and I like Duke to come out on top here.

#1 Syracuse vs #18 UNC | Tonight, 6:00pm | Line: Cuse -2

I mean… you know for a fact this isn’t going to be a 2-goal game. Syracuse has played 12 games so far this season. 9 of them have been decided by 1-goal and 8 of those have been wins. The last time Cuse and UNC played was April 15 and it was Sergio Salcido with the overtime game winner.

Now I’m very nervous that UNC has been so cheeks this year that this would actually be the perfect time for them to backdoor their way into the postseason by winning the ACC tournament. But they don’t play Hard Dick lacrosse. There’s no heart on that team right now. Zero pulse in the locker room. I know they’re playing for their lives here and a loss tonight means the reigning national champions have their season end in April. But when you play 8 Top 20 games and only find a way to win 1 of them, something is wrong with your team. There has to be a switch. There has to be an identity in that locker room that you don’t lose those big time games. Maybe they are all just content with what they did last year and thought they wouldn’t have to try this season. I don’t know. But everything that this UNC team lacks, this Syracuse team has it. So give me Cuse by 1.

The Other Guys:

Still a ton on the line in the last week of B1G regular season play. Here’s how Ohio State knocked off Maryland last week in overtime to shake up the standings.

Like I said before, there’s now 3 teams in the conference with just 1 loss. Ohio State, Maryland and Hopkins. That’ll have to change after this weekend as Maryland hosts Hopkins at 1 with the line set at Terps -1.5. Maryland was still able to get double digit goals but 10 was the least they’ve put up since the beginning of March. A lot of that has to due with Colin Heacock being out with an ankle injury. I still think Maryland comes out on top here but whether or not Heacock plays will determine if they cover or not. Right now I’m thinking Maryland by 1.

Then we have Ohio State taking a trip to Jersey to play Rutgers at 1 tomorrow. Line is set at OSU -2.5. Even without Heacock, you don’t beat Maryland by accident and you don’t beat Denver by accident. Ohio State is the real deal and they head into the B1G tournament as the 1 seed.

Jordie’s Picks (2-1-1 last week, 24-9-1 overall)

Last week’s picks were Denver -5 over Providence, they won 12-2. Maryland -1 over Ohio State, they lost 11-10 in overtime. Duke -4 over Marquette, they pushed and won 11-7. And UNC +3 against Notre Dame. They lost 14-13. So yeah, been doing this for quite a few weeks so far and still under 10 beats. Not a big deal. For this week we have…

• Loyola – 3.5 over Holy Cross
• Duke +1 over Notre Dame
• UNC +2 against Syracuse
• Denver -4 over Marquette

I like Hofstra over Towson but not enough to put my record on the line.

Ground Balls

The Tewaaraton Foundation released their 25 Tewaaraton Award finalists today and here are the men’s finalists.

My money is still on Connor Fields to win the award. Nice to see local Philly kid Michael Sowers as the only freshman to make the cut. I knew before the season that he was eventually going to be one of the best attackmen in the game. But I had no idea he would take over this early into his career. But yeah, my top 3 are Connor Fields, Sergio Salcido and Trevor Baptiste.

@BarstoolJordie