(Photo Courtesy of Duke Blue Devils)
By the end of this week, the calendar will have flipped to April, which means the final stretch of the regular season begins in college lacrosse. Across the landscape, every conference except for the A10 and Big East has begun conference play.
With that, it’s time to start taking a look at bracketology for the 2023 men’s DI lacrosse season.
How It Works
Here is a refresher as to how the NCAA Tournament works for those of you who may be unaware or have forgotten. The 2023 NCAA Men’s Lacrosse Tournament will feature eight seeded teams and nine non-seeded teams. Those teams will make up the 17-team bracket.
Nine teams will be automatic qualifiers (AQ) and those will all be conference champions from the America East, ASUN, Atlantic 10, Big East, Big Ten, CAA, Ivy League, MAAC, and Patriot League. Remember, the ACC does not have an AQ because a conference needs six teams to qualify for an AQ. The ACC only has five teams. With nine AQ’s, that leaves eights spots for at-large selections.
The NEC and SoCon disbanded as men’s lacrosse conferences after last season and the A10 jumped into the landscape. Those moves in conference realignment make the NCAA Tournament go back down to just one play-in game. That game will feature the two lowest ranked AQs and the winner will play the No. 1 overall seed in the first round.
Now how does the NCAA selection committee pick teams for at-large bids and seed teams for the tournament? According to the committee, they consider a multitude of things. The committee looks at record, strength of schedule index (based on team’s 10 highest-rated games), RPI results, average RPI wins and losses, head-to-head results, record against ranked teams (1-5, 6-10, 11-15, 16-20, and 21+), significant wins and losses, location of games, results versus common opponents, and any polls do not matter.
You can find the official NCAA pre-championship manual here.
Projected Automatic Qualifiers
We still have a lot of lacrosse to be played, but if the tournament started today this is what the AQ situation would look like. These selections are based on best conference record at the moment. For the leagues that have yet to begin play, the team with the best overall record or highest RPI rank is listed. Where there is a tie at the top of a conference, highest RPI is used.
| Conference | Team | Record | Conference Record | RPI Rank | SOS Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| America East | Bryant | 6-2 | 2-0 | 18 | 24 |
| ASUN | Jacksonville | 7-1 | 2-0 | 19 | 9 |
| A10 | UMass | 5-3 | 0-0 | 21 | 16 |
| Big East | Villanova | 7-1 | 0-0 | 9 | 5 |
| Big Ten | Maryland | 6-2 | 1-0 | 4 | 7 |
| CAA | Delaware | 6-3 | 2-0 | 25 | 36 |
| Ivy League | Cornell | 6-1 | 2-0 | 5 | 6 |
| MAAC | Manhattan | 6-2 | 3-0 | 46 | 29 |
| Patriot League | Army West Point | 7-1 | 4-0 | 17 | 8 |
Data from Lacrossereference.com – 3/27 (12:00pm)
Possible At-Large Selections
As previously mentioned, after those nine automatic qualifiers are set in stone, there are still eight other teams that will get in via at-large berths. This portion of the selection process is always fun, but maybe even more so this year with how tight things have seem to be across the landscape.
For this section this week, we are listing 16 teams that are in contention for a possible at-large bid after removing the projected AQs. Teams are listed in order based on their RPI rank. And as always, some of these teams listed have little to no chance of getting unless they get an AQ.
| Conference | Team | Record | Conference Record | RPI Rank | SOS Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ACC | Duke | 9-1 | 2-0 | 1 | 1 |
| ACC | Notre Dame | 6-1 | 0-1 | 2 | 3 |
| ACC | Virginia | 7-1 | 1-0 | 3 | 2 |
| Big Ten | Johns Hopkins | 8-3 | 1-0 | 6 | 4 |
| Big Ten | Penn State | 5-3 | 0-1 | 7 | 12 |
| ACC | North Carolina | 7-3 | 1-1 | 8 | 15 |
| Patriot League | Loyola | 5-3 | 2-1 | 10 | 13 |
| Ivy League | Yale | 3-3 | 0-2 | 11 | 27 |
| Big Ten | Ohio State | 5-4 | 1-0 | 12 | 18 |
| Big East | Georgetown | 4-3 | 0-0 | 13 | 17 |
| Big East | Denver | 4-3 | 0-0 | 14 | 21 |
| Ivy League | Penn | 3-4 | 1-1 | 15 | 25 |
| Big Ten | Rutgers | 7-2 | 0-1 | 16 | 10 |
| Patriot League | Boston U. | 7-1 | 4-0 | 20 | 11 |
| Big Ten | Michigan | 4-4 | 0-1 | 22 | 35 |
| Ivy League | Princeton | 3-4 | 1-1 | 23 | 28 |
Data from Lacrossereference.com – 3/27 (12:00pm)
Bids Per Conference
Before getting into what I think the bracket could look like at this time, let’s take a look at how many bids each conference could receive at the moment. There are a few conference that are sure to get multiple bids while other may get just get one bid. Some of the bottom conferences will obviously only get that one AQ, as usual.
ACC – Four
Big Ten – Three
Big East – Two
Patriot League – One or two
Ivy League – One or two
America East – One
ASUN – One
A10 – One
CAA – One
MAAC – One
2023 Projected Bracket 1.0
Without further ado, here is the first project for this season. Expect things to change quite a bit in the coming weeks as we inch closer to selection Sunday.
Last Four in: Penn State, North Carolina, Loyola, Yale
First Four out: Ohio State, Georgetown, Denver, Penn
Lacrosse Bucket 