May 4, 2008
2008 NCAA Div. I Men's Lacrosse Tournament Bracket
ANNAPOLIS, Md. - The 15th-ranked Navy men's lacrosse team (9-5) will travel to Chapel Hill, N.C. to face fourth-seeded North Carolina (8-5) next Saturday in the opening round of the 2008 NCAA Div. I Men's Lacrosse Tournament. Game time has been set for 7:30 pm at the Tar Heels' Fetzer Field and will be televised live by ESPNU.
Though Navy will make its fifth consecutive NCAA Tournament appearance, it's the first time in that five-year span that it was forced to wait until the selection show to find out if it would receive an at-large berth. Since joining the Patriot League in 2004, the Midshipmen had won four straight league titles to earn the conference's automatic bid. However, third-seeded Colgate had other plans for the Mids this spring, as the Raiders dealt Navy the program's first conference tournament loss (12-9) on April 25.
"Anyone who receives an at-large berth has earned their way into the tournament by way of their play at some point during the year ," said Navy head coach Richie Meade, whose Midshipmen last received an at-large bid in 1999 when Navy drew Hofstra in the opening round. "Nothing has come easy for our team this year and I really want to say how proud I am of them. I think they deserve the opportunity to play in the tournament and this is a credit to their determination and hard work throughout the year."
"We are all so excited to have this chance," said Navy team captain Jordan DiNola, who is one of 11 seniors on the team who will have played in the NCAA Tournament in each of their four seasons at the Academy. "We are definitely going to make the most out of this opportunity.
"It's certainly good to play someone who we are familiar with, but on the other hand, we haven't seen them this year. After having the week off to focus on finals, we are excited to get back out on the field and play."
Making their 25th appearance in the NCAA Tournament, the Midshipmen own a 15-24 record in postseason play. While Navy has never won an NCAA lacrosse title, it does have 17 USILA National Championships to its credit. The Mids are 5-6 in opening-round games and 2-2 since the field expanded to the 16-team format in 2003. Navy is 0-2 in championship games, losing to Maryland, 20-13, in 1975, and to Syracuse, 14-13, in 2004.
One would have to turn the pages back a quarter of a century to find the last time Navy had received an invitation to the Big Dance in five consecutive years. The NCAA held its first men's lacrosse championship in 1971 with Hall of Fame coach Willis Bilderback leading the Mids to a semifinals appearance against Maryland (L, 10-7) in the eight-team tournament. It was the first of 12-consecutive NCAA Tournament bids Navy would receive under Bilderback (2 trips) and Dick Szlasa (10 trips).
North Carolina, meanwhile, makes its 23rd overall appearance in the NCAA Tournament, including its second consecutive trip as a seeded team in the field. Ironically, it was Navy whom the Tar Heels drew a year ago to face in the opening round in Chapel Hill. Heavy rains pushed the Navy-North Carolina contest back a day, but it was the Tar Heels who would snap their five-game losing skid to the Mids by way of a 12-8 victory against Navy in Chapel Hill.
And while Navy had high hopes of avenging its loss to the Tar Heels this season in its annual regular-season showdown, a scheduling glitch kept the two institutions from meeting for the first time since 1995. But as fate has it, the two teams will make it 13 straight years they have battled when the two faceoff on Saturday at Fetzer Field.
The Tar Heels enter their first-round matchup against the Midshipmen with an 8-5 record, and like Navy, they have struggled as of late, dropping decisions in three of their last four games, all three to NCAA Tournament qualifiers (Virginia, Ohio State, Duke). Despite those losses, North Carolina has wins over NCAA tourney teams Denver, Cornell, Notre Dame, Johns Hopkins and Hofstra.
"North Carolina is the No. 4 seed for a reason," added Meade, who is a 1976 graduate of North Carolina. "They played a very difficult schedule and have some solid wins against quality teams. They are well coached and Chapel Hill is a difficult place to play at this time of the year. This will be a great challenge for our team."
The Navy-North Carolina series is deadlocked at 11 wins apiece with Carolina boasting an 8-3 advantage in games played on its home field. The two teams will meet for the fifth time in NCAA Tournament action with the Tar Heels holding a commanding 4-1 advantage with wins over the Mids in 1980, '81, '82 and '07. Navy's lone win in postseason play against Carolina was a 13-9 victory in 1976.
The winner of the Navy-North Carolina game will play the winner of the Hofstra-Johns Hopkins (5) contest in one of the two quarterfinal games played at Navy-Marine Corp Memorial Stadium on May 17. The other quarterfinal will feature the winners of the Denver-Maryland (7) and UMBC-Virginia (2) games.
The 16-team field includes seven conference champions with automatic qualification - American East Conference (UMBC), Colonial Athletic Association (Hofstra), Eastern College Athletic Conference (Loyola), Great Western Lacrosse League (Notre Dame), Ivy League (Cornell), Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference (Canisius) and Patriot League (Colgate) - with the rest of the field selected at large. Johns Hopkins is the only team to have made the championship bracket every year except 1971.
The 2008 NCAA semifinals and National Championship are set for May 24 and 26 at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Mass.
### Go Navy ###
