Johns Hopkins 2023

[flalax22]

I remember in the preseason when people like Sag A were looking at the schedule and said the Jays would be underdogs in every game and would be lucky to get to 7 wins. It's mid-April and we're already at 10. I believe the phrase was "I would do everything in my power to soften the schedule in order to have a winning record." Pathetic loser mentality then and even worse now. That's why he's an anonymous keyboard warrior and Pete Milliman is the coach.

That scheduling he took so much grief for looks awful smart now, doesn't it?

Smart? I don’t know about that. What I think it means is he understands the standards and expectations. Anybody that suggested a softer schedule doesn’t understand Hopkins lacrosse. I personally didn’t see where the wins would come in January. But that’s the thing the expectation is you find a way. Now I see a cohesive team that plays for each other. This team can compete with any team in college lacrosse. It’s a long time coming

It can also beat itself or help another team do the job. Maryland had 3/4 all conference players this week.

When looking at all the BIG10 teams. I’m not sure that’s unique to the Jays

[jhu06]

georgetown smoked loyola 23-7. I have enormous respect for that loyola program and not really sure what's going on there, but just underscores how important those injuries were to the fate of that game and perhaps our season.

[10stone5]

I remember in the preseason when people like Sag A were looking at the schedule and said the Jays would be underdogs in every game and would be lucky to get to 7 wins. It's mid-April and we're already at 10. I believe the phrase was "I would do everything in my power to soften the schedule in order to have a winning record." Pathetic loser mentality then and even worse now. That's why he's an anonymous keyboard warrior and Pete Milliman is the coach.

That scheduling he took so much grief for looks awful smart now, doesn't it?

Smart? I don’t know about that. What I think it means is he understands the standards and expectations. Anybody that suggested a softer schedule doesn’t understand Hopkins lacrosse. I personally didn’t see where the wins would come in January. But that’s the thing the expectation is you find a way. Now I see a cohesive team that plays for each other. This team can compete with any team in college lacrosse. It’s a long time coming

laf is showing Strength of Schedule at #7 before the Georgetown win, based on laf’s RPIs,
Massey has Strength of Schedule at #8 based off of their ratings.

[joewillie78]

Is the Loyola loss by both Hopkins and Maryland now considered a "bad" loss considering how far Loyola has tumbled since those 2 early wins?

Gobigred
Joewillie78

[HopFan16]

Is the Loyola loss by both Hopkins and Maryland now considered a "bad" loss considering how far Loyola has tumbled since those 2 early wins?

Yes. Loyola is #25 in the RPI, so it's a bad loss. Anything 21 and up is considered "bad." Doesn't matter that Loyola was a wildly different team two months ago. The numbers are what they are now.

A lot of teams have a bad loss this year. Duke has Jacksonville, Penn State and Cornell have Marquette, Penn and Villanova have Brown, Denver has Air Force, and Rutgers has Army, which, yes, technically counts as a bad loss (for now) as Army is currently #21 in RPI even though most people consider them to be a top 10 team.

[Sagittarius A*]

I remember in the preseason when people like Sag A were looking at the schedule and said the Jays would be underdogs in every game and would be lucky to get to 7 wins. It's mid-April and we're already at 10. I believe the phrase was "I would do everything in my power to soften the schedule in order to have a winning record." Pathetic loser mentality then and even worse now. That's why he's an anonymous keyboard warrior and Pete Milliman is the coach.

That scheduling he took so much grief for looks awful smart now, doesn't it?

Smart? I don’t know about that. What I think it means is he understands the standards and expectations. Anybody that suggested a softer schedule doesn’t understand Hopkins lacrosse. I personally didn’t see where the wins would come in January. But that’s the thing the expectation is you find a way. Now I see a cohesive team that plays for each other. This team can compete with any team in college lacrosse. It’s a long time coming

The thing about Hopkins lacrosse is not playing the toughest schedule, it's making the playoffs and going deep in the playoffs. Back in the day, the team may have only played 2-3 tough games a year. Hopkins lacrosse is about championships and to do that you have to make the playoffs. We had a 40+ year streak of making the playoffs until RD intervened.
Having said that, hats off to this team for making the discussion irrelevant and winning big games. This team plays like a team. They make mistakes but mostly they stay focused and pull off wins late in games, PSU game notwithstanding. While I think UMD has more overall talent than Hop does this year, the Jays can still pull of the upset Saturday if they stay focused and can win some draws. I do like that this team uses a lot of players, which keeps starters fresh and helps team dynamics. Would love to see them make a run right now.

[jhu06]

https://pressboxonline.com/2023/04/19/1 ... -marcille/

marcille sounds like a fascinating guy off the field.

[Ivyman]

Is the Loyola loss by both Hopkins and Maryland now considered a "bad" loss considering how far Loyola has tumbled since those 2 early wins?

Yes. Loyola is #25 in the RPI, so it's a bad loss. Anything 21 and up is considered "bad." Doesn't matter that Loyola was a wildly different team two months ago. The numbers are what they are now.

A lot of teams have a bad loss this year. Duke has Jacksonville, Penn State and Cornell have Marquette, Penn and Villanova have Brown, Denver has Air Force, and Rutgers has Army, which, yes, technically counts as a bad loss (for now) as Army is currently #21 in RPI even though most people consider them to be a top 10 team.

No. Cornell whooped Marquette. The bad loss was to Harvard.

[joewillie78]

Is the Loyola loss by both Hopkins and Maryland now considered a "bad" loss considering how far Loyola has tumbled since those 2 early wins?

Yes. Loyola is #25 in the RPI, so it's a bad loss. Anything 21 and up is considered "bad." Doesn't matter that Loyola was a wildly different team two months ago. The numbers are what they are now.

A lot of teams have a bad loss this year. Duke has Jacksonville, Penn State and Cornell have Marquette, Penn and Villanova have Brown, Denver has Air Force, and Rutgers has Army, which, yes, technically counts as a bad loss (for now) as Army is currently #21 in RPI even though most people consider them to be a top 10 team.

No. Cornell whooped Marquette. The bad loss was to Harvard.

What #RPI Is Harvard?
Gobigred
Joewillie78

[51percentcorn]

A small trip down memory lane

May 2022
"And I didn't see Cornell making any effort to hold onto Milliman. They just let him walk and ended up with the better coach.
He can't recruit and he sucks as a coach. Unless he wins the NC there's not way he gets a contract extension.
If I were him, I'd be looking for a new home ASAP."

May 2022
" I think it's safe to say Peter Milliman is the worst coach in the history of Hopkins lacrosse, reinforced be back-to-back seasons out of playoff contention. It wasn't just that he didn't make the playoffs, he wasn't even in contention. He has no five-star recruits in the next two classes. The article about his hiring is the poster for how not to hire a coach.
When Debbie Yow was out looking for a replacement for Cottle, she asked around and listened to coaches about who to hire. I don't think lacrosse was even a sport she was all that familiar with, but she listened to people and got the very best coach out there. Hiring your buddy from Cornell after ZOOM interviews has turned into an utter disaster. Milliman's "holier than thou", "my way or the highway approach" has sent the program into a tailspin. I don't care how he came up, or what dues he's paid, it's clear he's a FCJ. IT's going to be impossible to get top-tier transfers now while other BIG teams load up on them. Hopkins lax is seriously behind the eight ball now and it's Jen Baker's fault.
We have gotten rid of other coaches before. We will get rid of PM."

September, 2022
"If I were him I'd probably be looking for an exit strategy before his contract expires. Fading into the background and allowing the team to improve is, I think, the best option for him at this point."

October 2022
"I'm sorry, but that was like the lamest article ever. It took PM three years to explain to the team the importance of running out potential shots.
I can recall vividly Chic screaming to an attackman from across the field during practice " Did you have a shot? Did you have a shot?"
Woke era=losers
Thank you Jen Baker"

This little unrelated gem from October 2022
Ground balls and face-offs aren't as important as you think.

Here's one of the best from November, 2022
"Many things are commonly believed that are totally false. I could generate a long list here but it's beyond the scope of this forum.
IL has not been far off in predicting Hop's standing recently, so dismissing them completely doesn't seem sound.
So let's see in May who's right. Foy is (effectively) predicting a similar losing record as last year (Hop lost some pieces, got some replacements, it's a push) and you are (I assume) predicting a brighter future, say some kind of winning record, maybe 8-6, or 9-5 regular season.
So let's revisit this conversation in May.
Hint * get your excuses ready LOL"

Another November, 2022 classic
Coaches: This is easy. Reality: We have no idea what we're doing.
It's hard to watch a team with really bad fundamentals. First rule in sports: Don't beat yourself.
I have other issues as well. On top of that I don't think the HC really gives a damn one way or the other to be honest.
So, sorry, not optimistic.

A great one after the schedule came out
Insanity is doing the same things over and over again and expecting a different result.
Three losing seasons in a row suggests something must change or else you're stuck in a downward spiral.
You can't make the playoffs with a losing record. And you can't recruit well if you're not in the playoff conversation.
Hopkins used to have talent to play with anyone. It doesn't anymore. The coaches need to face reality, but all it's been from them is pure hubris from day one. "it doesn't matter what our stats were last year", "it doesn't matter what recruits are ranked," "We're going to score a lot of goals."
Right.
Your team can't have to pull off a miracle every week. It needs some softer games on the schedule, especially to start out with. A few games to build some confidence and tweak your lineup. Otherwise it's just mentally exhausting for the players.
You can keep playing a killer schedule, going sub .500 and not making the playoffs, or you can make adjustments. Increase your strength of schedule as your talent improves. Anyway, time is running out on this staff

And on to Feb
I think we can safely conclude now that this Hopkins schedule is moronic. The debate is over on that point. It wasn’t the sole cause of the losses to UNC and Loyola, but it didn’t help. And I don’t think we can exclude the possibility that it may have contributed to some injuries.

So IMHO - the team and staff have no need for you. We can all be wrong about things - For example, I was completely wrong about what goalie they would start but at least some rational thought went into the prediction and then I said I missed it by a mile. You should slink off into the background and not be heard from.

The thing about Hopkins lacrosse is not playing the toughest schedule, it's making the playoffs and going deep in the playoffs. Back in the day, the team may have only played 2-3 tough games a year. Hopkins lacrosse is about championships and to do that you have to make the playoffs. We had a 40+ year streak of making the playoffs until RD intervened.

What are you talking about? The difference in the "Back in the day era" such as the mid 80s there were only a few programs that were truly relevant - only Cornell/UVA/MD/Hopkins/UNC and Syracuse had won titles by 1985 - IN 1985 Hopkins played every single one of them except Cornell in the regular season. In 1984 - starting with UVA - Hopkins played the #3/#3/#5/#9/#8/#6/#15/#8/#5/#1 ranked teams (at the time) in order to go undefeated and win the title.
Look, there's a reasonable off season discussion to be had about scheduling philosophy. I have said befiore that I see some benefits to playing a game or two where you have a reasonable expectation there is more firepower on your side of the field - the primary one being you hopefully get to play everyone and they remain or are more engaged. For example, even though they are going up to Easton this year - UVA will likely handle the 5-8 Leopards next Tuesday and maybe by a sizable margin - it seems like Lars schedules a game like that at the end of every year - in the title year of 19 they tacked on VMI and Marist at the end of the season - scored over 20 in both. Duke famously does the no scrimmages max amount of game events and throws in a couple where they might go in knowing they have more talent. The biggest drawback to the Hopkins schedule in my opinion is that it took until the next to last game of the year to play over 30 players. All that being said all the credit to the HEAD COACH - not the volunteer aassistant for correctly identifying that RPI is one of the committee's KING criteria and creating a schedule that puts Hopkins in the forefront of that metric.

[primitiveskills]

I remember in the preseason when people like Sag A were looking at the schedule and said the Jays would be underdogs in every game and would be lucky to get to 7 wins. It's mid-April and we're already at 10. I believe the phrase was "I would do everything in my power to soften the schedule in order to have a winning record." Pathetic loser mentality then and even worse now. That's why he's an anonymous keyboard warrior and Pete Milliman is the coach.

That scheduling he took so much grief for looks awful smart now, doesn't it?

Smart? I don’t know about that. What I think it means is he understands the standards and expectations. Anybody that suggested a softer schedule doesn’t understand Hopkins lacrosse. I personally didn’t see where the wins would come in January. But that’s the thing the expectation is you find a way. Now I see a cohesive team that plays for each other. This team can compete with any team in college lacrosse. It’s a long time coming

The thing about Hopkins lacrosse is not playing the toughest schedule, it's making the playoffs and going deep in the playoffs. Back in the day, the team may have only played 2-3 tough games a year. Hopkins lacrosse is about championships and to do that you have to make the playoffs. We had a 40+ year streak of making the playoffs until RD intervened.
Having said that, hats off to this team for making the discussion irrelevant and winning big games. This team plays like a team. They make mistakes but mostly they stay focused and pull off wins late in games, PSU game notwithstanding. While I think UMD has more overall talent than Hop does this year, the Jays can still pull of the upset Saturday if they stay focused and can win some draws. I do like that this team uses a lot of players, which keeps starters fresh and helps team dynamics. Would love to see them make a run right now.

Which "day" is this that you speak of, when we only played "2-3 tough" games a year? Until the '90s, there may have been only 5 truly good teams each year (some combo of Maryland, Cornell, Syracuse, UVa, UNC, Navy, Army... depending on which decade you are speaking of). Princeton joins the ranks in the 90s. We played all of these teams each year, so if there was a "tough game" to be had, we played it. It is only when you get to the 2000s when there become too many good teams to schedule them all, and still we've always had a top 5 schedule in terms of difficulty. The only thing that has really limited the difficulty of the schedule is joining the B1G, and as that league evolves, that hasn't limited SOS much either.

[primitiveskills]

Is the Loyola loss by both Hopkins and Maryland now considered a "bad" loss considering how far Loyola has tumbled since those 2 early wins?

Yes. Loyola is #25 in the RPI, so it's a bad loss. Anything 21 and up is considered "bad." Doesn't matter that Loyola was a wildly different team two months ago. The numbers are what they are now.

A lot of teams have a bad loss this year. Duke has Jacksonville, Penn State and Cornell have Marquette, Penn and Villanova have Brown, Denver has Air Force, and Rutgers has Army, which, yes, technically counts as a bad loss (for now) as Army is currently #21 in RPI even though most people consider them to be a top 10 team.

No. Cornell whooped Marquette. The bad loss was to Harvard.

What #RPI Is Harvard?
Gobigred
Joewillie78

Harvard is in the 30s

[HopFan16]

A small trip down memory lane

Lol. We're all wrong about things on occasion but Mr. Astrological Sign over here has made it a career. The best part is he will never own up to any of it and is going to continue on pretending he didn't say any of those things. That sampling of posts only scratches the surface. You know more is coming too. Anything short of a national championship and it'll be right back to the same idiocy. You can already see the goal posts moving.

Ivyman — yes, meant Harvard, not Marquette. The point was that having a "bad loss" is going to be something a lot of playoff teams share this year.

Marcille is a character. There's that adage that many goalies are just built different and he certainly fits the bill. But I do think it's worth noting his play has tailed off somewhat since the Syracuse game, which admittedly was quite the performance. He's under 50% in 4 of the 6 games since then. A stout performance from him on Saturday night would go along way toward pulling off the upset.

Would also be good to get Callahan going out of his slump. He was the lone bright spot in last year's lopsided regular-season game vs. the Terps going >50% vs. Wierman. It's gonna take all three guys and the wings to scrap our way to a semi-respectable faceoff percentage this weekend. That's going to be Maryland's biggest advantage. I think our D can hold up reasonably well against their O provided they are not constantly having to play defense.

[joewillie78]

Is the Loyola loss by both Hopkins and Maryland now considered a "bad" loss considering how far Loyola has tumbled since those 2 early wins?

Yes. Loyola is #25 in the RPI, so it's a bad loss. Anything 21 and up is considered "bad." Doesn't matter that Loyola was a wildly different team two months ago. The numbers are what they are now.

A lot of teams have a bad loss this year. Duke has Jacksonville, Penn State and Cornell have Marquette, Penn and Villanova have Brown, Denver has Air Force, and Rutgers has Army, which, yes, technically counts as a bad loss (for now) as Army is currently #21 in RPI even though most people consider them to be a top 10 team.

No. Cornell whooped Marquette. The bad loss was to Harvard.

What #RPI Is Harvard?
Gobigred
Joewillie78

Harvard is in the 30s

Yup, just checked lax reference and they are exactly #30.
Gobigred
Joewillie78

[51percentcorn]

Lol. We're all wrong about things on occasion but Mr. Astrological Sign over here has made it a career.

That's not even including his truly offensive and reprehensible posts such as the one about Thanking God a Hopkins player was no longer in the roster - not brought back ironically by the coach he hates - and the inexcusable implications with the post "More trouble at UVA" following a mass/fatal shooting.

Back to reality - Hopkins faces several challenges and '16 hit upon them. Alot of it revolves around specialty areas. 63% face-off record for Wierman is #1 but we all know face-offs are not as important as you might think (actually in reality between two other wise fairly matched teams it can be the difference maker). If Narewski can compete for a number of face-offs with a 20 handle and Dunn can chip in - maybe the impact can be mitigated to the necessary degree. Goalie is #2 - MD's freshman had a great outing against Rutgers and the Hopkins goalie has been exactly at 40% or below in 3 of the last 5 games - those 3 games were also the last 3 games played in the evening (though he clealry has played well in the evening in the Jacksonville/UNC/Navy games). #3 is MD's defense which seemed to have its mojo back against Rutgers - maybe some die-hard Scarket Knight fans were holding out hope but you knew 10 minutes in what the approximate score of that game was going to be. Hopkins probably needs a juice goal or two from a pole or unexpected source and quality possessions because you are not going to turn that defense inside out when they are on their P's & Q's. It seems like the buzz phrase of all the commentators this year is "the defense is creating offense for the other team". Hopkins must avoid the ball watching and the unnecessary out of control slides that are bugaboos at times. Terps will pick that apart.

[nyjay]

So Hop at +2, O/U at 24.5, both of which feel fair to me, which I wouldn't have been able to say at the beginning of the year.

I think this one is going to come down to the specialists and turnovers (going on a big limb there, I know). Assuming Nawreski is able to take 15+ draws, I'm pretty confident that the Jays can keep the FO battle relatively even (i.e Weirman under 60%). The turnover stats seemed to have improved recently as well, and so I think we'll end up with a reasonable number of shots and possessions, as will MD. 6 on 6, I think these teams are pretty even (MD is a little better on defense, JHU probably a little better on offense). I think it all comes down to goalie play (a consistent theme in my posts). While I probably feel a little better about Ruppel than Marcille, I think Marcille is due for an excellent game and I think he has the right personality to do it on a big stage. So, with that background, I think the game will be a fairly typical Jays game for this year - the Jays start strong, build a decent early lead and try to hang on through the middle of the game as MD comes back. This time, the Jays hold on at the end to pull the upset. 13-11 Jays (so the under and a push). Marcille ends at 58%.

(PS - I had this drafted before 51's prior post. Glad to see we broadly agree.)

[nyjay]

So Hop at +2, O/U at 24.5, both of which feel fair to me, which I wouldn't have been able to say at the beginning of the year.

I think this one is going to come down to the specialists and turnovers (going on a big limb there, I know). Assuming Nawreski is able to take 15+ draws, I'm pretty confident that the Jays can keep the FO battle relatively even (i.e Weirman under 60%). The turnover stats seemed to have improved recently as well, and so I think we'll end up with a reasonable number of shots and possessions, as will MD. 6 on 6, I think these teams are pretty even (MD is a little better on defense, JHU probably a little better on offense). I think it all comes down to goalie play (a consistent theme in my posts). While I probably feel a little better about Ruppel than Marcille, I think Marcille is due for an excellent game and I think he has the right personality to do it on a big stage. So, with that background, I think the game will be a fairly typical Jays game for this year - the Jays start strong, build a decent early lead and try to hang on through the middle of the game as MD comes back. This time, the Jays hold on at the end to pull the upset. 13-11 Jays (so the under and a push). Marcille ends at 58%.

(PS - I had this drafted before 51's prior post. Glad to see we broadly agree.)

well, not a push obviously (just correcting myself).

[Wheels]

The three top-line stats I always look for when it comes to Maryland this year:

Shots (get as close to 50 as possible), turnovers (15 or fewer), and Wierman (60+%).

When the Terps hit all 3, they're going to win comfortable. When they hit 2 of the 3, they're more in the 1-2 goal win range. When they only 1 of the 3, they're probably not going to win.

The reason why is pretty simple. They're a terrible shooting team. They take good shots, but they don't a ton on frame. Even when they do get a ton on frame, they'll hit the goalie in the body a bunch of times. They've made a few goalies look really good this year, and they've made some very good goalies look like all-timers.

Marcille can get in their heads, especially if he's hot early. If he lets in early goals, the Terps will get confidence.

[jhu06]

The three top-line stats I always look for when it comes to Maryland this year:

Shots (get as close to 50 as possible), turnovers (15 or fewer), and Wierman (60+%).

When the Terps hit all 3, they're going to win comfortable. When they hit 2 of the 3, they're more in the 1-2 goal win range. When they only 1 of the 3, they're probably not going to win.

The reason why is pretty simple. They're a terrible shooting team. They take good shots, but they don't a ton on frame. Even when they do get a ton on frame, they'll hit the goalie in the body a bunch of times. They've made a few goalies look really good this year, and they've made some very good goalies look like all-timers.

Marcille can get in their heads, especially if he's hot early. If he lets in early goals, the Terps will get confidence.

Look at their website. Volumes of quality shots, force turnovers, limit their assisted goals.

not sure what happened to stuart phillips and ian krampf. both were staff and message board favorites earlier this year and staff has been high on phillips for awhile. would assume both will resurface this season barring injury.

[primitiveskills]

The three top-line stats I always look for when it comes to Maryland this year:

Shots (get as close to 50 as possible), turnovers (15 or fewer), and Wierman (60+%).

When the Terps hit all 3, they're going to win comfortable. When they hit 2 of the 3, they're more in the 1-2 goal win range. When they only 1 of the 3, they're probably not going to win.

The reason why is pretty simple. They're a terrible shooting team. They take good shots, but they don't a ton on frame. Even when they do get a ton on frame, they'll hit the goalie in the body a bunch of times. They've made a few goalies look really good this year, and they've made some very good goalies look like all-timers.

Marcille can get in their heads, especially if he's hot early. If he lets in early goals, the Terps will get confidence.

Thanks for venturing into enemy territory on game week!

I expect Wierman to go 60%+, so the most interesting part of the game will be how Maryland fares on offense in settled possessions. From what I've seen of Maryland this year, they are really inconsistent in this phase. Last week's game was a good example: there were times where the ball movement was frighteningly good; at other times, not so much. Erksa is starting to give non-Maryland fans bad Bernhardt flashbacks; the match-up with Scott Smith should be good. Murphy seems like a wild card. He seems like the guy who has been hurt the most by the loss of the better offensive players from last year, but I'd expect for him to be up for this game.