This past weekend was week four of the Premier Lacrosse League! The teams had their annual stop at historic Homewood Field in Baltimore.

With it being the California Redwood’s bye week, a good portion of the former Irish in the league had the week off, but the ones who played were exceptional.

New Faces

Before we get into the recap, there have been some roster moves and more Irish are in the league! First off, the Motor City Hitman, Sergio Perkovic, has been moved off the injured reserve and is now on the active roster.  It was a bit of a slow start, but that is to be expected after being away from the game as long as he has. Perkovic took the place of Eric Dobson which unfortunately means for the time being Dobson will not be on an active roster for now. With how good of a player he is we hope a team picks him up so we can continue to play and we can keep watching him.

On a more positive note, the Redwoods picked up SSDM Carter Parlette out of the player pool. Parlette should make his PLL debut this upcoming weekend in California! He played a huge part on defense on both national championship teams, and we look forward to being able to watch him pay again!

Back at Quarterback

After a bit of a slow start to the season, the Denver Outlaws have won two straight to put themselves at an even 2-2. We would like to point out that this “resurgence” has happened at the same time that the Outlaws have put PKav back into his normal quarterback roll in where he directs the offense. In this week’s win over the Archers, Pat had 56 touches of the ball. That is over 15 more than the next player. It’s not like he was passively facilitating either, rather he used his control of the ball to dish out 3 assists and create 11 shot opportunities for himself to create a goal to go along with them.

While we completely understand the argument that many make that the Outlaws should run though a player like O’Neil, we think the numbers these past few weeks prove the PKav is their guy. This comes from a difference in the playing styles of the two players. While O’Neil is a very ball-dominant player and can beat most match-ups, that’s that very thing that makes him not necessarily as good of a “quarterback” candidate because he is very much score-first. Compare that to PKav who is an assist-first player. As we have seen through games like the 2024 National Championship where he had 6 assists and no goals, is fine sitting back and dishing the rock while the defense has to waste a match-up on him. This playstyle fits that quarterback role much better in our eyes.

Cos-tahb-eee-lay

Brian Costabile reminded us why he is in the Irish midfielder Pantheon. He had is second hat-trick of the year for the New York Atlas in his 4-goal performance (including two 2-pointers!). He now leads all PLL midfielders in scoring.

Making Offenses Lose Hope

This week was a bit of a slower week for the Irish-alum defenses, at least compared to what they have been doing so far (they still played amazing). Of the three defensemen that played this week (all 3 of which are on the Cannons) they racked up a pretty good 3 CTO’s and an outstanding 6 ground balls. These guys’ performances continue to speak for themselves. Especially considering we are calling weeks where they put up amazing numbers “a bit slow”.

Entenmann went crazy this week, again. He set a new career high in saves with 22 this game, coming just 3 off of tying Blaze Riordan’s single game record (that he just set this season). Entenmann finished the game at 71%, which is absolutely nuts. Even crazier is the fact that he was sitting at around 90% for nearly the entire first half.

With Entenmann, it feels like we say the same thing over and over but he is just truly that good. It is amazing how he continues to be dominant and game changing every week. His presence on a roster immediately makes the floor of his team a deep playoff run. If the Atlas are able to pull off a championship win, it will be on his back.

Week Five: California

Next week is the Redwoods homecoming weekend in San Diego! The game slate for the weekend is Outlaws (PKav) vs Redwoods (now including Parlette!), Archers vs Atlas (Costabile and Enty), Waterdogs (Taylor) vs Redwoods (lots of Irish), and Cannons (Ramsey California homecoming, Epple and Kielty) vs Chaos (Perkovic and maybe Dobson). It will be a great one at a great venue!

#GoIrish

ND-ATL 2.0