College Crosse Prospectus: MLL Has A New Commissioner

GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOD MORNING, College Crosse Nation!! Thanks for making us a part of your day! Here are your links for February 6, 2018.

What You Missed

New episodes of Across College Lacrosse and College Crossecast are up! Guess which one talks about the Eagles?

Is Jacksonville on the rise?

Lacrosse The Nation

Major League Lacrosse officially announced Sandy Brown as their second commissioner in league history:

Brown is an accomplished executive with over 20 years of leadership experience who has spearheaded the launch and growth of multiple sports media outlets. Most recently, he was the President/CEO of One World Sports, where he launched the HD channel across both linear and digital platforms to over 50 million subscribers through cable and satellite distributors as well as over-the-top (OTT) platforms.

“I’m thrilled to be joining Major League Lacrosse as its next commissioner,” Brown said. “The opportunity to combine one’s vocation with something for which they are utterly passionate very rarely occurs. I am grateful to the MLL ownership and board for providing me with this exciting and unique opportunity.”

In 2010, Brown became President of Univision Sports, the leading media outlet for Spanish-speaking Americans. He created and launched Univision Deportes to over 15 million homes and developed multi-platform programming. Additionally, Brown oversaw the rebranding of Univision Sports, and as well, the production of the highest rated primetime sports broadcast in the channel’s history at the time with the Mexico vs. Honduras match in the 2011 Gold Cup.

“Dave Gross’s passion for the sport of lacrosse is inspiring,” said Jake Steinfeld, Founder of MLL. “We searched far and wide to find a worthy torch bearer to maintain the standards set by Dave and I’m excited to say we’ve found him in Sandy Brown! His ability to navigate the global sports media and marketing landscape combined with his prowess to ‘sell the dream’ is unprecedented.That’s it for today!! I’ll see you out there!! Make sure you follow us on social media!

Gross will reportedly stay as president of Lax United Marketing, LLC, which owns Lax Sports Network, according to Inside Lacrosse.

Navy only one three face-offs in their loss to Jacksonville on Sunday. They didn’t have Joe Varello due to an indefinite suspension, according to Bill Wagner of the Capital Gazette:

Varello has been allowed to practice with the team while his situation is reviewed by Captain Robert B. Chadwick II, the Commandant of Midshipmen at the Naval Academy. [Rick] Sowell said the senior has been performing remediation, but still has additional steps to take. “We were hopeful last week that Joe would be cleared to play, but obviously that did not happen so we’ll have to wait and see what happens,” Sowell said. “All the feedback I had received indicated Joe was progressing well so I do think it will be sooner rather than later.”

Freshman long stick midfielder Jeff Durden took the majority of faceoffs against Jacksonville and finished 2-for-13. Sophomore midfielder Brad Alexander filled in and finished 0-for-8 while junior faceoff specialist Mike Loscalzo won the only draw he took.

“We are definitely thin at the position without Joe, and also inexperienced,” said Sowell, noting that none of the aforementioned players had taken a faceoff in a collegiate game prior to Sunday. “Faceoffs are a key component of the game so we’ve got to figure this out.”

Sowell said Durden will continue to handle a majority of faceoffs using his long pole, but he also sees considerable action on defense and will need a rest. If Varello is not cleared to play this Saturday at Maryland, Loscalzo will likely see an increased workload.

Quint Kessenich of Inside Lacrosse has his A to Z guide for this season.

Meanwhile, our good buddy Paul Carcaterra dropped a new episode of reLAXin’ with PCarc, featuring Syracuse Orange LSM Austin Fusco:

The USILA unveiled their team of the week:

One of those players was Ryan Keenan, who’s wearing No. 16 in honor of the late Connor Darcey, as Matt Kinnear of Inside Lacrosse writes:

“First day wearing No. 16 is an honor. I wanted to go out there and compete and honor Connor’s spirit. Compete my ass off for Connor. That’s all I wanted to do,” Keenan said.

Keenan, a senior out of Smithtown, N.Y., had 23 points on 10 goals and 13 assists last season. He was humble postgame. “Play hard, compete, and that’s it,” he said about his role with the team. “I’m a role player. I’m not the best player on the team. I’m not close to being the best offensive player. I’m a role player.”

His role was a bit of everything Saturday. He was too tough to cover for Villanova’s shortsticks, with Keenan taking them down the alley to score. And, he played incredible efficiency with his offensive touches. This is all while scooping five groundballs, tops on the team besides face-off specialist Gerard Arceri, often playing wing. He played defense, too.

Some sad news: Former Providence Friars head coach Kevin Murray has passed away at the age of 54. He was the head coach of the Friars from 1987 until 1995.

Two ACC teams have new helmets:

It’ll be tough for me to get used to the “Hoos” script.

Furman Paladins head coach Richie Meade recaps Thursday’s loss to Vermont and previews Saturday’s game against North Carolina:

Rutgers is getting a brand new lacrosse facility!

Marquette Golden Eagles head coach Joe Amplo isn’t worried about the lack of scoring depth on his team, pens Brendan Ploen of The Marquette Wire:

“It’s going to be a more team-focused approach on offense,” Amplo said. “In the past, we’ve had some guys who have put in really good individual performances. I think you’ll see that but not as consistently as you have in the past until roles develop.”

The graduations of Ryan McNamara, Andy DeMichiei and Kyran Clarke were already going to make offense more difficult this year. Tanner Thomson’s injury redshirt made that problem even harder to solve. The emphasis is going to be placed on junior John Wagner, who scored 22 goals last season, to lead the attack.

“He understands that now the ball is going to be in his stick most of the time,” Amplo said. “He’s accepted it, and I think he likes it.”

Through two preseason exhibition games, the Golden Eagles have proven to be a competitive squad with combined 19 goals against Cleveland State and No. 11 Johns Hopkins. In Saturday’s scrimmage, over 30 players got minutes as the Golden Eagles held the Bluejays scoreless in the second quarter. But Hopkins pulled away with four fourth-quarter goals to steal a home victory.

Over at UMass Lowell, 2018 is looking like a very important year for the program, writes Hanna Manning of The UMass Lowell Connector:

UMass Lowell men’s lacrosse enters this season as its first with a recruited senior class, with members that include defenseman Will Puduski, attack/midfielder Sean Tyrell and midfielder Cory Highfield. Puduski, Tyrell and Highfield also serve as three of UMass Lowell’s four captains alongside senior attack/midfielder Jon Phillips. Stephenson expressed pride with his core of talented and responsible seniors, not only on the field, but in the classroom.

“[UMass Lowell men’s lacrosse] has always been number one or two in each of our first three years academically in the conference. We’ve set this year, with our first senior class, to be number one and never relinquish that. That’s what I had done when I was at Binghamton and certainly that’s been our goal here,” said [Ed] Stephenson.

Stephenson and his coaching staff work hard to make sure that winning games does not jeopardize their players’ academic and personal success. In establishing a positive culture at UMass Lowell, Stephenson said that he and the other coaches limit practice time during the week and the amount of road games that they play in order to make sure that the players can focus on school.

On the field, Stephenson said he praised his senior athletes for their willingness to take charge of practices and embrace their leadership role on the team. He also said he thinks back on how much the seniors have changed since their freshman year and is struck by the difference in how they hold themselves and participate on the team.

“I really just sat back the first day of practice and smiled,” said Stephenson. “These guys are doing a great job leading.”

18 Stripes has another post on how John Sexton is the best LSM in the entire nation.

Women’s news: The Temple Owls look for a team identity for this season, from Dan Wilson of The Temple News:

They were picked to finish sixth in the Big East Conference preseason poll in 2016. They finished with a 13-6 record before the season ended in a loss to the University of Florida in the Big East championship game. Despite losing their starting goalkeeper to graduation and being predicted to miss the postseason, the Owls had another Big East tournament matchup with the Gators and won 13 games in 2017.

Temple now finds itself in a similar situation, in need of inexperienced talent to step up. Seven seniors, who combined to score 64.8 percent of the team’s goals, graduated after last season.

Unlike the past two seasons, Temple is predicted to qualify for the Big East tournament by finishing fourth in the league.

“One of the things we really pride ourselves in this program is developing everyone and figuring out where our strengths are,” coach Bonnie Rosen said. “We’ve been really proud that pretty much every year we’ve had seniors that were strong contributors, and now we’re back at the start of the season where we’re trying to find our team identity.”

High school news: Loyola Blakefield has named Gene Ubriaco as their new boys’ lacrosse head coach. Glenn Graham of The Baltimore Sun notes that he will take over for the 2019 season.

Philly Jawns

The Philadelphia Eagles’ parade will be held on Thursday.

World News

The Dow lost over 1,000 points yesterday.

Video of the Day

Here’s Jay Ajayi and Corey Clement on “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” last night.

That’s it for today!! I’ll see you out there!! Make sure you follow us on social media!

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Managing Editors: Safe Fekadu, Chris Jastrzembski, Ryan McDonnell