Did College Lacrosse Just Cuck March Madness? I Don't Know. You Tell Me

Photo via Inside Lacrosse

Let me set the scene for you real quick. The date is Sunday, March 12th in the year two-thousand-seventeen. The #1 ranked Notre Dame Fighting Irish take a trip over to Denver to play against the #4 Pios in a game that could very easily see a rematch on Memorial Day. The game is tied 10-10 with just seconds left to play and looks like overtime is inevitable. That is, of course, until Denver’s Connor Cannizzaro loses control of the ball, scoops it back up, takes it to the cage and finishes it off with a backhand crease dive for the win at the buzzer.

ONIONS!!!

Now I know that yesterday was Selection Sunday for the NCAA Basketball tournament. I know we’ll be seeing plenty of big time buzzer beaters over the next few weeks. But a backhanded crease dive in a game between two top-5 opponents? In the words of the late great philosopher Futre, “we ballin’ like the March Madness”.

It’s just a shame that pretty much nobody saw this game unless you were actually there at the game since the only other way to watch it was through Denver’s online stream which is behind a paywall. Trying to get people to pay almost $10 per month for college lacrosse games is a pretty tough sell. If you’re trying to choose between that or being able to watch every episode of The Office on Netflix then lax is just gonna have to wait. All I’m saying is that more college lacrosse games need to be televised nationally. At least games that feature 2 of the top teams in the country. I don’t know how broadcasting rights work. I get it’s not as easy as ESPN just saying “yup, this game is going on TV today”. But still. How the NCAA lacrosse community doesn’t push for their product to be in front of as many eyes as possible is pretty ridiculous. This game had everything you could ask for. Teams were trading goals back and forth. You had Ryder Garnsey up to his regular Maestro ways.

You had Connor Donahue taking his defender to Shake Shack and then going as low-to-high as humanly possible on the snipe.

And then you had the buzzer beater at the end to cap it all off. We in the biz like to call that an “instant classic” pretty much the same way that every Notre Dame vs Denver game ends up being. And dozens of people got to watch it all happen in real time. Regardless, that was one of the best endings to a game you’ll see in all of collegiate athletics this month.

I’m @BarstoolJordie, Barstooooool Sports