The Crease Dive Wraps Up The 2018 NCAA Lacrosse Season
And just like that, another year of college lacrosse has come and gone. There are 71 schools that compete in NCAA DI Men’s lacrosse. Only one of them can end their season with a win on Memorial Day. And in the 2018 chapter of college lacrosse, it was the Yale Bulldogs getting it done for the first time yesterday after taking down Duke 13-11 and capping off an absolutely dominant season. This was a team who was just two overtime losses away from having an undefeated regular season. This was a Yale team that suffered a minor setback against Cornell in the Ivy League Championship, but they had also won the Ivy League Championship the previous 3 seasons and lost in the first round of the NCAA Tournament in all 3 years. So it wouldn’t surprise me to find out they just decided to take it easy that game on purpose.
Two overtime losses on the regular season and an Ivy League Championship game were the only games this year which the Yale Bulldogs didn’t come out on top. We talk about it on this episode of the podcast but this Yale team was one of the more complete teams that I can remember in a while. They are dominant in all areas of the field. Their offense is led by Tewaaraton Finalist, probable Tewaaraton winner and one of the most gifted players to come through the game, Ben Reeves. Outside of Reeves, they are loaded, they are deep, and they are lethal. Their faceoff guy, Connor Mackie, was a 3rd Team All-American. Their defense was led by a freshman 1st Team All-American, Chris Fake, and they’re a bunch of big ass bullies down there who look like they live in the weight room. Their freshman goaltender Jack Starr put on a clinic this weekend. There’s not a single area in their game that this team was weak in, and when you’re that good all over the field? Well that’s how you end up winning a National Championship.
So yeah. The boys hit the mics on the car ride home from Foxboro yesterday to recap the Duke vs Yale game, the entire weekend at Gillette, and to say our final farewells to the 2018 NCAA Lacrosse season. If the audio quality sounds a little shaky, again, it’s because we were in the car stuck in Memorial Day traffic after a long ass weekend. You can listen to today’s episode right here.
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Just a few sidenotes here before we wrap this thing up…
1) Quick shoutout to all the players this weekend. From the Women’s Championships to the DII and DIII Championships to the DI Final Four. Playing college lacrosse on Memorial Day Weekend is the biggest stage that the sport has to offer in terms of popularity. There are so many people who could have only dreamed to get on that stage, and all of these guys and girls got to live that out. So even the teams that ended their season with a loss this weekend, they got to a point where I’d say 90-95% of the lacrosse population couldn’t. And that’s fucking awesome. Oh and an even bigger shoutout to Connor Fields who was playing the last month and a half on a torn ACL and still managed to put up 5 points in his semifinal game on Saturday. Hockey Tough mother fucker right there.
2) Another shoutout to everybody this weekend at Gillette who stopped by to show us love. When we started this podcast back in January, we weren’t exactly sure what to expect. We didn’t know what the reception would be like or if it would be worth our time or not. But the amount of support we receive from current players, former players and fans this weekend was overwhelming. I really can’t express how much we appreciate that. I know that lacrosse is still a smart sport. I know the lacrosse community is a tight one, but also a small one. With that being said–the lacrosse community is without a doubt in my mind the greatest collection of people that human beings have to offer. We’re just glad to be a part of it.
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3) Would just like to thank all the guests that came on the show during the season. Not to pipe ourselves up too much here but we ended up having 6 First Team All-Americans, 3 Tewaaraton Finalists, a few more 2nd Team/3rd Team/Honorable Mention All-Americans. We had former #1 overall draft picks. We had the face of the sport, Paul Rabil. We had the future of the sport, Tehoka Nanticoke. It means a lot to us that players of that caliber would take the time out of their day to talk some bullshit with us.
4) Moving forward, The Crease Dive obviously isn’t going to be a weekly show. I know that we have a couple of interviews lined up for the NLL Championship, we’ll be covering the World Championships and touch on some MLL things here and there. But it was a long as season and with the summer coming up here, TCD will most likely only return when something important is going on. But once next year’s NLL season rolls around, it’ll be back in full force.
5) Last thing here but make sure to throw Robby O a follow on Twitter. Kid grinds his ass off. He’s earned it —>@R_Zetti.
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