Cavs, Terps and Mids Are In; Hoyas Left Out
Virginia's Ben Rubeor, front, got tangled with Matt Bocklet of Johns Hopkins during a game in March. The Cavs and Blue Jays are two of 16 teams still playing.
(By Andrew Shurtleff -- Daily Progress Via Associated Press)
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Monday, May 5, 2008; Page E04
Virginia, Maryland and Navy each received a bid to the 16-team NCAA men's lacrosse tournament, the field for which was announced last night.
However, Georgetown (9-4) had its streak of 11 consecutive tournament appearances snapped. The Hoyas defeated No. 1 Duke and Navy in the regular season; both of those teams made the tournament.
But the Hoyas finished 18th in RPI and in the 20s in strength of schedule, largely because of a down year for its conference, the Eastern College Athletic Conference. The Hoyas were not helped by a 12-11 overtime loss to unranked Penn State on Saturday.
The five-member NCAA tournament selection committee was chaired by Bucknell senior associate athletic director Tim Pavlechko. Maryland Coach Dave Cottle was the only coach on the committee.
"It was a very difficult process," Cottle said. "Being on the committee, we tried to get the best teams into the field. I know that I felt Georgetown was one of the top teams in the country. But they were let down by the [relative weakness of] their conference. They had some real quality wins, but their league fell apart a little this year."
The final two at-large teams appeared to be Navy (9-5) and Denver (10-6). The Midshipmen finished No. 15 in RPI. Denver was No. 12.
Georgetown entered with the second-longest active consecutive appearances streak. (Johns Hopkins has made the tournament 37 consecutive years.)
The tournament field was announced on ESPNU. And in a surprisingly insensitive oversight, early in the broadcast ESPNU listed the teams with the most consecutive tournament appearances. Georgetown was not listed; Navy, which entered the day with four appearances, was given credit for having been in five consecutive tournaments.
"I know won-loss record and strength of schedule are still two strong parts of the equation. But when they factor in other components, it tends to get a little fuzzy," Georgetown Coach Dave Urick said. "I think a couple of things that we don't have control over came into play.
"Our league this year had some less-than-usual results. And that certainly affected us. But you still kind of scratch your head a little bit when you see Navy and Denver in. Those are the two we're trying to make sense of."
The Midshipmen will face No. 4 North Carolina (8-5) on Saturday night in Chapel Hill, N.C. The Tar Heels defeated Navy, 12-8, in an NCAA tournament first round game last year.
Navy was greatly helped by results from Saturday. Almost every team vying with it for an at-large spot lost: Georgetown, Army (to Penn), Princeton (to Brown) and Albany (to UMBC).
