Our Notre Dame Fighting Irish (9-4) take on the #5 Penn State Nittany Lions (11-4 ) for a spot in the Final Four. Faceoff is Sunday at noon and will be played at Navy-Marine Corps Stadium in Annapolis. It will be broadcast on ESPNU.
The Irish will look to continue their dominant lacrosse that we saw in their round one game versus Ohio State. The Nittany Lions are looking for a return trip to Memorial Day weekend after their controversial end to their season in 2023. They will not be an easy team to beat.
The Opponent
While their record may suggest a slight struggle this year, Penn State had a consistently strong season with no bad losses. Their four losses have all come against the best teams in the nation, with two losses to Maryland, a loss to Ohio State and a loss to Cornell in overtime. This will be not be any easy win.
Offensively, the Nittany Lions are led by Matt Traynor (#22) with 36 goals and 16 assists. Traynor is supported by Liam Matthews (#51) with 23 goals 4 assists, Kyls Lehman (#4) with 22 goals 7 assists, Jack Aimone (#55) with 22 goals 10 assists, and Luke Walstrum (#21) with 16 goals 14 assists. As is apparent from the stats, they have no lack of scoring threats.
Matt Traynor tied his career-high with 7 goals in @PennStateMLAX‘s win over Johns Hopkins 🙌#B1GMLax pic.twitter.com/iqmdjdQkwF
— Big Ten Lacrosse (@B1GLacrosse) April 12, 2025
This Penn State team is a very assist heavy unit. Our defense will have to watch out for the one more pass, something that has been a consistent challenge for Notre Dame.
On defense, they are led by Kevin Parnham (#16) with 29 CTOs and 39 GBs, and Alex Ross (#6) with 21 CTOs and 27 GBs. Between the pipes is Jack Fracyon (#11), who has 130 saves on the year putting him at a 49% save percentage. This unit is not weak by any means but is also not the team’s strong suit. The boys should have no problem picking this defense apart.
Their faceoff unit is strong. Lynch, Hagstrom and the wings will have their hands full.
Our Questions
- Maintained Dominance: Plain and simply, the 14-3 run starting from just after the beginning of the second quarter in last week’s Ohio State game is what we have been looking for all season. While we don’t expect something as crazy, we still hope to see a similar level of dominance from the boys this week.
- Controlling their offense: As we previously said, this Penn State offense has a ton of threats. The defense needs to force them to play our game and get them out of their comfort zone. The boys were able to do that last week and we trust they can repeat the same effort. Communication on the off side will be critical.
- Stopping unnecessary turnovers: Last week’s game had an unusual 19 turnovers. This simply can’t happen again against a team like Penn State. The boys need to limit the Nittany Lion’s chance on offense, and the best way to do that is to keep the ball in our hands and stop the turnovers.
This is the last game between the Fighting Irish and a third straight Memorial Day weekend appearance. This game gives the Irish the chance to prove everything we have thought of them all season. Don’t miss it!
Notes
In Saturday’s quarterfinals, Syracuse beat Princeton and Cornell beat Richmond to secure places in the Final Four. Both were one-goal games that were instantly labelled instant classics, but only by fans who don’t like defense. They were fun games to watch, but defense was definitely sold separately.
Our seniors and graduate students had the honor of graduation on the road. It’s a traditional that signals both academic and athletic excellence, since it only happens if the team is in the playoffs for a Memorial Day berth. Congratulations to the boys!
🎓🎓🎓
Graduation on the road never gets old! Congrats to the class of 2025.#GoIrish☘️ pic.twitter.com/Ckpbhs1BWT
— Notre Dame Lacrosse (@NDlacrosse) May 17, 2025
Please also take the time to listen to the Exit 77 Notre Dame lacrosse podcast, hosted by our friends Drew Brennan and David Brogan. Lastly, there is still time to contribute to the CityLax initiative sponsored by CKav and Shawn Lyght.
#GoIrish
ND-ATL 2.0
That did not go according to plan. We feel terribly for the boys, but they let it get away from them after a magical first 40 minutes.
There seemed to be a lot of mental errors even in the first 40′.
Brutal final 20 minutes
I was busy most of the morning, and managed to catch the game starting when the score was 12-6 I think.
I dont think I saw them do 1 positive thing the entire time I watched.
I cant help but think that this season reminds me a lot of the Women’s BBall season. Extremely talented, ranked #1 at some point in the season, obliterated weaker opponents, but rode emotional waves to their detriment, and couldnt get out of their own way in some harder games, ultimately losing games in both the ACC and NCAA tourney where they just couldnt put it together. For both teams it felt like they were outcoached – but I really like both of their coaches.
Im just not sure what the problems were, hoping someone with more knowledge can shine some light.
We’re still formulated out final thoughts, but like you, we’ve been drawn to comparisons with WBB.
We tend to be delicate with the non-revenue sports, and with good reason. But it’s very fair to ask hard questions after this season. We are out of the superteam era, but this squad had, by some margin, the most attributes of the old super teams. This doesn’t mean a three-peat should have been a layup, but a quarterfinal collapse to an OK team requires examination of a lot of things.
https://www.ndinsider.com/story/sports/college/lacrosse/2025/05/19/notre-dame-lacrosse-reflects-on-2025-finale-that-got-away-penn-state-kevin-corrigan-chris-kavanagh/83670602007/
Both Ramsey and Kavanagh mentioned that they got comfortable and didnt play hard. That’s what I saw. This happens in all of college sports, which is part of what makes it fun – these are young adults, equally capable of mistakes as well as heroic accomplishments.
So, while I wonder if coaching should be looked at, I know sometimes there’s just not much that can be done.
Full transparency – I know nothing about lacrosse
Now that we’ve got that out of the way, let’s discuss. You guys can’t be seriously contemplating/thinking about coaching changes or heck even comparing it to the WBB situation.
This coach just dominated the sport for the past 2 years and has built the program. It’s hard enough to repeat, let alone 3 peat.Ivey and the WBB haven’t accomplished anything and have pretty much underperformed to expectations since she’s started. This feels more akin to suggesting moving on from Muffet than the WBB situation.
Again, I don’t know enough about the specifics of the lacrosse team. Just know how hard it is to get kids up to play, let alone 3 years in a row.
That was what I was trying to get to – I dont think a coaching change in either sport is what is needed. Just, it felt in all 4 tournaments (2 by each team), the coaches couldnt get the players out of their own heads. The WBB team would get flustered and start playing “hero ball” taking bad shots and throwing bad passes. It seemed to me the LAX team would get either get in a funk or get relaxed, and turnover the ball too much and not move enough on offense to generate good looks.
But I think this is just a problem of college kids. ND has some great coaches, and if they cant motivate these players, maybe no one can. Im not sure.
We’re not suggesting anything like that. Coach C has earned the right to stay forever as far as we’re concerned. But it’s fair to discuss why this roster was flat all season. it’s also fair to compare against Maryland, for whom this situation never happens. They’ve made 10 of 12 final fours or something like that? Teams can’t stay at their peak forever, we agree, but this was not supposed to be the let down year. They were preseason #1 with 9 preseason all-americans for a reason. If the reason isn’t determined and fixed, it will happen again. Being in the lacrosse wilderness is no fun.
All this being said, it’s also important to note we are not alone. UVa, UNC, Duke all asking the same questions, and Cuse is just this year coming out of a long stretch in the wilderness.
To me this feels more like UGA football. 2 years of absolute domination. Then after that, while still more or less the most talented team in the country, some serious let downs.
That’s a pretty good comparison
Following up on a couple of thoughts shared in the comments, we should recognize a difference between asking questions and panic. We are definitely not in the latter category. Roster is great, recruiting classes are great, coaches are great. It’s a top program and a huge national draw, and an enviable home field experience. This is a final four combo, as it was this season. Shrugging our shoulders and chalking it up to kids being kids would be a disservice to the program these same kids and their coaches have built.