Sun May 16 2021 | Matt DaSilva | College
PHOTO BY JACK DEMPSEY
Loyola goalie Sam Shafer makes a save on Denver s Alex Simmons with five seconds left to preserve the Greyhounds 14-13 NCAA tournament first-round win Sunday at Peter Barton Lacrosse Stadium.
Sam Shafer is 6-foot-3, 235 pounds. Loyola’s senior goalie needed all his big body frame to make the last-second save that will go down as one of the most clutch plays in recent NCAA men’s lacrosse tournament memory.
Shafer denied Denver’s Alex Simmons on the doorstep before time expired to preserve Loyola’s 14-13 win Sunday over the seventh-seeded Pioneers, exasperating the sold-out 40-percent capacity crowd at Peter Barton Lacrosse Stadium and sending the Greyhounds to the NCAA quarterfinals. It was Shafer’s 16th save of the game.
There are a lot of similarities between Jackson Morrill and his father, Mike.
Both grew up in Baltimore to US Lacrosse Hall-of-Fame fathers. Both are and were stellar attackmen. Both played with a high IQ to outsmart opponents and earn big roles. But one similarity came to fruition only this past season when Jackson made the decision to spend his fifth year of eligibility at Denver to play for coach Bill Tierney, who coached Mike as an assistant coach at Johns Hopkins in the 1980s.
Tierney and Mike won the 1985 and 1987 national titles with those dominant Blue Jays teams. Now, Jackson is going into the first round of the 2021 NCAA Tournament looking for his second ring. For that chase to be under the same coach who helped his dad get two of his own isn’t lost on just how incredible that would be.
Eight automatic qualifiers are up for grabs over the next week.
With the Patriot League Quarterfinals on Tuesday night, there s no reason to turn away from your laptop or TV for the next six days with the amount of action on much of it staggered across the day so you ll be able to see most finishes.
Here are our picks for conference champions a piece that s routinely become bulletin-board fodder on Championship Saturday.
America East
Terry Foy: UMBC
I’m picking the Retrievers because of a combination of home-field advantage, conference tournament experience, close game experience and the idea that defense wins in May (which, in the shot clock era, I’m not even certain is true any longer).
Monday May 3rd, 2021 8:00am
(Photo Notre Dame Athletics)
Conference tournaments take center stage this week as eight leagues will hand out AQs and a trip to May Madness. The NCAA Tournament will also welcome eight at-large selections. The ACC will grab five of the eight at-large bids. That leaves three open spots for teams that fail to capture their league crown. It’s as easy as 8-8-5-3. Runners-up with resumes from the Patriot, Big East and Big Ten are likely to receive those three last bids.
All the intrigue makes this week the most intense of the season, the moment of truth. Win and advance, lose and go home.
Denver players had to sit in the stands in the season opener to adequately social distance.
Scenes From a Season on the Fly
Thu Apr 29 2021 | Nelson Rice | College
This story appears in the April edition of US Lacrosse Magazine. Don t get the mag? Join or renew today. Thanks for your support!
Bill Tierney has seen a lot.
You’re bound to when your coaching career began in 1976 at Great Neck South High on Long Island. But nothing in the intervening 45 years during which Tierney has reached the height of his profession several times over not the seven NCAA Division I championships, the nine title game appearances or the 15 final four berths as a head coach prepared him for when he looked up into the stands of Denver’s Peter Barton Stadium on Jan. 30 after the longest offseason he’s ever experienced.