Well, we’re finally here. After the dog days of summer, fall ball appetizer, pre-season polls, early season games, conference play, conference tournaments, Selection Sunday, & the first two weekends of NCAA Tournament games, we’ve finally reached the Final Four. We have two huge match-ups today with some extraordinary players. I think we are in for a treat in both games.

Directly below is the Big Board for today. Clicking on the team name will take you to that team’s homepage, while clicking on the Stream/TV cell will take you to the broadcast of that game. Additionally, clicking on the Live Stats cell will take you to the live stats of that particular game. All times Eastern Standard Time.

Team Game Day Previews

Virginia Game Day Preview

The Virginia Cavaliers (15-3) and the Duke Blue Devils (13-4) meet on Saturday in the semifinal round of the 2019 NCAA Championship at Lincoln Financial Field in Philadelphia. The ACC foes are facing each other for the second time this season and for the first time in the NCAA Tournament since the 2010 NCAA Semifinals in Baltimore. Faceoff is set for noon. UVA is ranked No. 4 in the USILA coaches poll and No. 3 in the Inside Lacrosse/Maverick media poll. Duke is ranked No. 5 in both the coaches and media polls.

UVA, champions of the Atlantic Coast Conference, is the No. 3 national seed and earned an at-large bid. The Cavaliers advanced to their 23rd Championship Weekend with a 13-12 overtime win over Maryland in the quarterfinal round. Duke also earned an at-large bid and is the No. 2 national seed. The Blue Devils advanced to their 12th Championship Weekend with a 14-13 overtime win against No. 7 national seed Notre Dame.

Duke Game Day Preview

SETTING THE SCENE

Duke is the No. 2 overall seed and advanced to its 12th NCAA semifinal with a 14-13 overtime win ov­er Notre Dame in the quarterfinal. The Cavaliers, the No. 3 seed, edged Maryland in overtime 13-12 to return to the semifinals for the first time since 2011.

Duke last was the two seed in 2005. The Blue Devils advanced to the NCAA title game that season before losing to top-seeded Johns Hopkins, 9-8.

Virginia is 15-3 overall, the regular season and ACC Tournament champion, and a winner of six straight. The Blue Devils were the last team to beat the Cavaliers in 2019.

Yale Game Day Preview

The defending national champions are back in the NCAA Semifinals this Saturday. The Bulldogs (14-3), the No. 5 seed, take on top-seeded Penn State (16-1), which is looking to avenge its only loss of the 2019 season. The “Northern” semifinal at Lincoln Financial Field in Philadelphia airs live on ESPN2 following the noon “Southern” semi of No. 2 Duke and No. 3 Virginia. SERIES vs. PENN STATE Yale and Penn State have played 4 times since a 1940 exhibition, box lacrosse meeting inside Payne Whitney Gym. The Elis have a 3-1 edge including an NCAA Tournament contest at State College in 2013.

Penn State Preview

The No. 1-seed Penn State men’s lacrosse team will take on No. 5-seed Yale on Saturday, May 25 at 2:30 p.m. in the NCAA Semifinal game at Lincoln Financial Field. The game will be aired on ESPN2 with Anish Shroff, Quint Kessenich and Paul Carcaterra on the call.

THE MATCH-UP

Penn State and Yale have only matched up four times in the history of the two programs with the Bulldogs holding a 3-1 advantage by winning the last two meetings. Penn State got the first win of the series in a 11-6 neutral location game on March 12, 1997. Yale took the March 11, 2003 match by the score of 17-15, and they took the May 11, 2013 NCAA First Round game, 10-7, in University Park.

College Crossecast NCAA Tournament Final Four Preview

Jake & Ryan previewed all the games this weekend on our College Crossecast NCAA Tournament Final Four preview show.

It is Memorial Day weekend already, which means the 2019 NCAA Men’s Lacrosse Tournament is coming to a close. Duke, Penn State, Virginia, and Yale vie to claim the throne of national champion, except by playing for it on the field rather than whatever out of nowhere plot point that dragon show did. That means we’ve got a special edition of COLLEGE CROSSECAST to lay down the roadmap for each team to get to the top.

On this episode, we’ll get you all prepped for championship weekend with previews of Duke-Virginia (4:32), Penn State-Yale (23:55), and give out some predictions (46:30) and fun little factoids for the final four (54:15).

2019 NCAA Men’s Lacrosse Championship Weekend Preview: What you need to know

Chris has everything you need to know about Championship Weekend right here.

After a wild quarterfinal weekend with three overtime games, we only three more men’s Division I lacrosse games left to play. And they’ll all be held in the cheesesteak capital of the world, Philadelphia.

Safe and I will be down for the grand finale of the college lacrosse season (I might be doing other things as well). Four great teams, three more games, two winners on Saturday, one national champion. And you can catch all the action on ESPN2!

We’ll have individual team previews as well as matchup previews based on the schedule of the semifinals.

Attachments

I went to Media Day yesterday. It was a ton of fun. You should also check out my post on the star of Media Day, Yale’s Handsome Dan.

Penn State enters NCAA lacrosse Final Four as unlikely overwhelming favorite.

To the casual observer, Penn State has been an overnight sensation in men’s lacrosse. Though the Nittany Lions will be making their first championship weekend appearance in Philadelphia on Saturday, they look for all the world like the odds-on favorite to claim their initial title.

Penn State (16-1), the No. 1 overall seed, is riding a 13-game winning streak and features the nation’s top-rated offense totaling 18 goals a game. While the other three semifinalists all needed overtime to survive the quarterfinal round last weekend, the Nittany Lions fittingly won their tilt with Loyola (Md.) by a footballesque 21-14 margin.

He grew up around Duke’s lacrosse program. Now he’ll start for the team in the Final Four.

CJ Carpenter will join a long list of Duke attackmen who have started an NCAA lacrosse tournament semifinal when he takes the field Saturday. It’s only fitting since he’s spent time around the Blue Devils’ program since he was about 4 years old and his parents attended lacrosse final fours involving Duke since before he was born.

Meet Duke’s John Danowski,

After graduating from Rutgers University in 1976, John Danowski decided to pursue a career in education and coaching. It was only fitting. He was following in the footsteps of his father, Ed, a former quarterback and halfback who led the New York Giants to the 1934 and 1938 NFL championships. When Ed’s playing career ended, he spent three decades teaching physical education in East Meadow, N.Y., and coaching in college, high school and junior high school.

Yale’s ready for semifinal bout against Penn State.

Despite being the defending national champion, the five-seeded Yale men’s lacrosse team enter this year’s championship weekend as the underdog once again, this time against this year’s heavyweight and favorite No. 1 Penn State.

The Bulldogs (14–3, 5–1 Ivy) emerged from last weekend’s quarterfinal match against conference rival No. 4 Penn (12–4, 6–0) with a clawed-out overtime victory to advance to championship weekend for a second consecutive year.

8 burning questions to be answered in the 2019 men’s lacrosse semifinals.

The lacrosse semifinals weekend seems so far away for most of the year. Thankfully, it’s finally here. Yale vs. Penn State. Duke vs. Virginia. The possibilities — well, they’re not endless, but they are exciting.

We don’t want you to miss a minute, so we dove into the numbers and storylines before things kick off Saturday afternoon.

Here are eight questions that will be answered by the time a champion is crowned Monday.

1. Is Yale a powerhouse now?

Celebrating 25 years of the NCAA Lacrosse Championship on ESPN.

Twenty-five years ago, only the NCAA men’s championship title game was televised. Today, we are proud to say that ESPN’s regular season coverage is more robust, and the entire tournament is covered across ESPN2 and ESPNU. We have been a leader in reflecting the growth of the sport, and we are excited to be airing our 25th consecutive men’s lacrosse championship this weekend. If you look at the face of the game now, there are more than 70 NCAA Division I men’s programs.

Great work by Chris.

He wasn’t lying.