North Carolina 2023

[Gorilla Fan]

Remember those years when the attack was stacked with Holman, Bitter and company?

[Farfromgeneva]

"Breschi is on par with Corrigan"

Since Breschi got to Carolina (2009), here is the track record between Carolina and Notre Dame

Championships
UNC: 1
ND: 0

Final Fours
UNC: 2
ND: 5

Quarterfinals
UNC: 6
ND: 11

NCAA Tournament appearances
UNC: 10
ND: 13

NCAA Tournament wins
UNC: 10
ND: 18

Winning percentage
UNC: 66.5%
ND: 70.5%

Conference record since 2014 when ND joined ACC
UNC: 17-26
ND: 26-17

H2H: 9-6 Notre Dame

Since Breschi's championship, Corrigan has 4 Quarterfinals to Breschi's 1, 4 NCAA Tournament wins to Breschi's 2, 5 NCAA Tournaments to Breschi's 2, and the H2H is 5-3 Notre Dame. Breschi has made the Final Four once and Corrigan hasn't since 2015

Those...don't look like two coaches on par to me. That looks like one coach is clearly better than the other. If you want to say Breschi has proved he can win a championship and Corrigan has not, fair, but...why isn't he winning nearly as much? If we're doing the 25 year trend and history thing, wasn't like Notre Dame was making a ton of Final Fours 25 years ago. It's not like Notre Dame is far easier to recruit to than North Carolina. Not like admissions standards are different there or anything. And yet one guy has more than double the Final Fours, almost double the Quarterfinals, almost double the NCAAT wins, and is way better in the same league.

Listen, if Carolina believes that it's not at the level of Syracuse, Maryland, Hopkins, Virginia, or Duke in terms of what it's able to achieve, then I certainly understand keeping Breschi. But Breschi himself has achieved far more than what he's been doing the last 6-7 years and is no longer doing that. He still recruits at a very, very high level; the school recruits itself. And Maryland was told a lot of these same things when they let go of Cottle. That the track record was what it was, Maryland was a Quarterfinal program not a Final Four or Championship one, you're making a mistake giving up on the sure thing. Does that mean UNC would get the same results as MD did? Of course not. But just because UNC wasn't good with John Haus - who's record is very similar to Breschi's over the last 6-7 years - doesn't mean they can't achieve more. We've seen them do it very recently. And admitting to your fans that you don't view yourselves on par with those schools...probably isn't going to sit well with the fans.

There's no guarantee a new coach would have been the right move and if they didn't have a good name in mind to go after, yeah, certainly reasons to keep Breschi. But it's not hard to see where UNC fans' frustration comes from. They haven't been anywhere near as good as their rivals for 6-7 years and the school just said we're okay with that. Or...maybe they aren't, because they gave him a 3 year deal and not 5, so they are going to need to give him a new contract again in 2 years and are sending him out there to recruit high school players with no contract that guarantees he will be there for the duration of their college career. In which case, if you aren't confident enough in him long term to give him a 5 year deal...why are you extending him? The way it played out, I get where some UNC fans would want a change. Doesn't mean it would have worked out. There are no guarantees.

No to the bolded. That would be incorrect. And I never heard anyone say that abide MD when Cottle was going. He performed better than Breschi before getting pushed out as well. Not even comparable .

Notre Dame made a final four in 2001 for the first time, when there were first round hues before it expanded to 16 in 2003. Then didn’t see a final four again until 2010. They didn’t even make another quarterfinal from 2001-2008.

Frustration doesn’t mean make potential existential change. I get frustrated with my elementary aged children but I don’t give them up for adoption or try to trade with the hot mom down the block. Just because someone pushed back in firing the guy doesn’t mean they don’t understand frustration in being a fan and not getting the results they want. Some of the leaps to conclusions and logic just fails here.

[Farfromgeneva]

Carolina is more similar to Princeton than the other ACC title holders, or Maryland, or Hopkins.

Aside from the Tierney years, Princeton is a contender, competitive, but hasn’t really threatened to win a national title.

Most of UNCs major success was compressed in that decade or so Willy Scroggs era — 4 national titles, 22 of UNCs NCAA wins were during that stretch.

Breschi has been as good or better as any UNC coach, including Klarmann.

Willie Scroggs is of course the extreme outlier,
that guy was unreal.

Breschi is not as good as Tiffany, he’s not as good as Tillman, he’s not as good as Danowski — but Breschi is on par with Corrigan.

He got the extension.
Let’s see what happens with that, nothing will get settled now or even this year.

UNC made 18 Quarterfinals appearances over 21 years. You could argue that most of Duke's success has happened over a shorter period of time.
Let's ask a more important question, what is UNC missing that they had in the 80s and early 90s? Do we lack recruiting? Facilities? Brand?

You could make this same argument about Georgia football before they hired Kirby Smart. Just because they had underperformed for decades doesn't mean that there program is incapable of becoming elite again. There is nothing structurally about UNC that prevents them from being as elite as Maryland, Duke or UVA.

There was a first round by until 2003….old quarters don’t mean much.

[Farfromgeneva]

Carolina is more similar to Princeton than the other ACC title holders, or Maryland, or Hopkins.

Aside from the Tierney years, Princeton is a contender, competitive, but hasn’t really threatened to win a national title.

Most of UNCs major success was compressed in that decade or so Willy Scroggs era — 4 national titles, 22 of UNCs NCAA wins were during that stretch.

Breschi has been as good or better as any UNC coach, including Klarmann.

Willie Scroggs is of course the extreme outlier,
that guy was unreal.

Breschi is not as good as Tiffany, he’s not as good as Tillman, he’s not as good as Danowski — but Breschi is on par with Corrigan.

He got the extension.
Let’s see what happens with that, nothing will get settled now or even this year.

UNC made 18 Quarterfinals appearances over 21 years. You could argue that most of Duke's success has happened over a shorter period of time.
Let's ask a more important question, what is UNC missing that they had in the 80s and early 90s? Do we lack recruiting? Facilities? Brand?

You could make this same argument about Georgia football before they hired Kirby Smart. Just because they had underperformed for decades doesn't mean that there program is incapable of becoming elite again. There is nothing structurally about UNC that prevents them from being as elite as Maryland, Duke or UVA.

What is UNC missing? An anachronistic legacy smoke filled room system with a smaller competitive pool of programs. ND, OSU, Duke and GT were all irrelevant when UNC was last regularly making quarters. That’s 200 kids who might’ve gone to UNC. Even if they only pulled 2% of the exception ones from those programs and stick them on UNCs current team and project the difference. Not to mention academics have become harder notwithstanding the gross grade inflation colleges have succumbed to the last 40yrs.

Comparing lacrosse to FBS football is insane. Literally. And having moved to GA a dozen or so years ago and having a in low balls deep at Tech on inside info you would not like how UGA got there. Would make the test taking / paper writing scandal look like a 20yr old throwing a legged in his dorm room. This is the kindest things you can find on UGA football (setting aside the mass arrests regularly, guy who killed a girl after the championship game drag racing in a small town street drunk etc)

https://247sports.com/LongFormArticle/C ... 173848072/

[Farfromgeneva]

UNC is an elite program that has won 5 National Championships with 3 different head coaches and been to 14 Final Fours in 4 different decades. UNC has been one of the most elite programs in the country every year since 1976, with the exception of a 10 year stretch from 1997-2006 and the last 7 years since 2017.
I hate it when people act like these last 7 seasons is the historical norm at UNC. From 1976-1996, UNC was a top 3 program in the country. We struggled from 1997-2006, however lets not act like that decade should be viewed as the standard. From 2007-2016 UNC was a top 5-8 program in the country again. Since 2017 we have fallen drastically.

Here is UNC's NCAA tournament seed every year since 1976. I will be the first to admit tournament seeding is not perfect, but I hate it when people say UNC was only an elite program for a decade. Cause that simply isn't true.

1976 - 5 Seed
1977 - 7 Seed
1978 - N/A
1979 - N/A
1980 - 5 Seed
1981 - 2 Seed
1982 - 1 Seed
1983 - 5 Seed
1984 - 5 Seed
1985 - 3 Seed
1986 - 5 Seed
1987 - 5 Seed
1988 - 3 Seed
1989 - 6 Seed
1990 - 4 Seed
1991 - 1 Seed
1992 - 2 Seed
1993 - 1 Seed
1994 - 4 Seed
1995 - Unseeded
1996 - 4 Seed
1997 - N/A
1998 - Unseeded
1999 - N/A
2000 - N/A
2001 - N/A
2002 - N/A
2003 - N/A
2004 - 8 Seed
2005 - N/A
2006 - N/A
2007 - 8 Seed
2008 - 4 Seed
2009 - 6 Seed
2010 - 4 Seed
2011 - 8 Seed
2012 - 8 Seed
2013 - 5 Seed
2014 - Unseeded
2015 - 3 Seed
2016 - Unseeded
2017 - Unseeded
2018 - N/A
2019 - N/A
2021 - 1 Seed
2022 - N/A
2023 - N/A

Many UNC fans rightfully don't believe we should be settling for the standard set the last 7 years when we are clearly capable of being better then that.

So the exception being 17 of the last 25yrs right? You’ve carved out 68% of the most current and contemporary quarter century from your analysis. I have to ask, do you work in commercial title or trade credit insurance?

[jrn19]

"Breschi is on par with Corrigan"

Since Breschi got to Carolina (2009), here is the track record between Carolina and Notre Dame

Championships
UNC: 1
ND: 0

Final Fours
UNC: 2
ND: 5

Quarterfinals
UNC: 6
ND: 11

NCAA Tournament appearances
UNC: 10
ND: 13

NCAA Tournament wins
UNC: 10
ND: 18

Winning percentage
UNC: 66.5%
ND: 70.5%

Conference record since 2014 when ND joined ACC
UNC: 17-26
ND: 26-17

H2H: 9-6 Notre Dame

Since Breschi's championship, Corrigan has 4 Quarterfinals to Breschi's 1, 4 NCAA Tournament wins to Breschi's 2, 5 NCAA Tournaments to Breschi's 2, and the H2H is 5-3 Notre Dame. Breschi has made the Final Four once and Corrigan hasn't since 2015

Those...don't look like two coaches on par to me. That looks like one coach is clearly better than the other. If you want to say Breschi has proved he can win a championship and Corrigan has not, fair, but...why isn't he winning nearly as much? If we're doing the 25 year trend and history thing, wasn't like Notre Dame was making a ton of Final Fours 25 years ago. It's not like Notre Dame is far easier to recruit to than North Carolina. Not like admissions standards are different there or anything. And yet one guy has more than double the Final Fours, almost double the Quarterfinals, almost double the NCAAT wins, and is way better in the same league.

Listen, if Carolina believes that it's not at the level of Syracuse, Maryland, Hopkins, Virginia, or Duke in terms of what it's able to achieve, then I certainly understand keeping Breschi. But Breschi himself has achieved far more than what he's been doing the last 6-7 years and is no longer doing that. He still recruits at a very, very high level; the school recruits itself. And Maryland was told a lot of these same things when they let go of Cottle. That the track record was what it was, Maryland was a Quarterfinal program not a Final Four or Championship one, you're making a mistake giving up on the sure thing. Does that mean UNC would get the same results as MD did? Of course not. But just because UNC wasn't good with John Haus - who's record is very similar to Breschi's over the last 6-7 years - doesn't mean they can't achieve more. We've seen them do it very recently. And admitting to your fans that you don't view yourselves on par with those schools...probably isn't going to sit well with the fans.

There's no guarantee a new coach would have been the right move and if they didn't have a good name in mind to go after, yeah, certainly reasons to keep Breschi. But it's not hard to see where UNC fans' frustration comes from. They haven't been anywhere near as good as their rivals for 6-7 years and the school just said we're okay with that. Or...maybe they aren't, because they gave him a 3 year deal and not 5, so they are going to need to give him a new contract again in 2 years and are sending him out there to recruit high school players with no contract that guarantees he will be there for the duration of their college career. In which case, if you aren't confident enough in him long term to give him a 5 year deal...why are you extending him? The way it played out, I get where some UNC fans would want a change. Doesn't mean it would have worked out. There are no guarantees.

No to the bolded. That would be incorrect. And I never heard anyone say that abide MD when Cottle was going. He performed better than Breschi before getting pushed out as well. Not even comparable .

Notre Dame made a final four in 2001 for the first time, when there were first round hues before it expanded to 16 in 2003. Then didn’t see a final four again until 2010. They didn’t even make another quarterfinal from 2001-2008.

Frustration doesn’t mean make potential existential change. I get frustrated with my elementary aged children but I don’t give them up for adoption or try to trade with the hot mom down the block. Just because someone pushed back in firing the guy doesn’t mean they don’t understand frustration in being a fan and not getting the results they want. Some of the leaps to conclusions and logic just fails here.

People absolutely said this when Maryland fired Cottle. Bill Tierney wrote a column in Inside Lacrosse talking about how crazy it was. Here’s what Patrick Stevens wrote at the time.

“Maryland was a Quarterfinal team on an annual basis under Cottle, and a little better in the second half of Edell’s time in College Park. 30 years is a pretty decent sample size. And at some point after the players, coaches, and administrators come and go, the onus has to fall on something as faceless as the institution.”

Then he said if Tillman won 70% of his games, and reaches a Final Four every 3 to 4 years, it will be time for “those who shunned a serious examination of the program vis-a-vis the consistent title contenders in the last month to reconsider their perspective of Maryland lacrosse.”

That’s pretty much exactly telling Maryland that your history is what you are, and this wasn’t on the coach you got rid of, it’s on you, and when the next guy you brought in to replace him does the same thing…blame yourselves.

Frustration maybe may not mean make change, but you don’t just keep a coach for the sake of keeping a coach either because of another coach’s results from 20 years ago or because it’s a “non revenue sport.” Examine the pluses and minuses of the job, what you can expect to accomplish if a coach is fully maximizing all of the benefits of the job, and then decide if the current coach is meeting that standard and expectation or if someone else would do a better job. If being in the basement of the ACC behind Duke, UVA, and Notre Dame and being a borderline Top 20 team with one great season in there is the standard at UNC or there’s no one out there that can do better, then keep Breschi. That’s the decision UNC made. It’s not the decision Cuse, Hopkins, UVA, or Maryland made. But lacrosse is a different priority at those schools. And I don’t think borderline Top 20 over 7 years is the level UNC should be at when you consider the conference they’re in, the recruits that they’re able to bring in, and both their recent and long term history. It suggests they’re closer to Top 10 or Quarterfinal level. That hasn’t been what they’ve achieved. They decided Breschi is the most likely to get back there. We’ll see if they’re right. But they definitely didn’t set him up for success by giving him a contract that will have Lars Tiffany going to every recruit and saying “UNC doesn’t even trust this guy enough to give him a contract that lasts long enough for him to be your coach for your whole career.” Which smells a lot like keeping a coach for the sake of it. I don’t think that’s any better a decision than choosing to move on. They could have moved on or made clear he’s their guy long term. They chose neither.

But it seems like any answer given here that’s not keep the guy is met with “not understanding logic” or whatever so I’ll dip out here

[Brownlax]

Will JB keep both coordinators?

[Lewisfrederick]

Carolina is more similar to Princeton than the other ACC title holders, or Maryland, or Hopkins.

Aside from the Tierney years, Princeton is a contender, competitive, but hasn’t really threatened to win a national title.

Most of UNCs major success was compressed in that decade or so Willy Scroggs era — 4 national titles, 22 of UNCs NCAA wins were during that stretch.

Breschi has been as good or better as any UNC coach, including Klarmann.

Willie Scroggs is of course the extreme outlier,
that guy was unreal.

Breschi is not as good as Tiffany, he’s not as good as Tillman, he’s not as good as Danowski — but Breschi is on par with Corrigan.

He got the extension.
Let’s see what happens with that, nothing will get settled now or even this year.

UNC made 18 Quarterfinals appearances over 21 years. You could argue that most of Duke's success has happened over a shorter period of time.
Let's ask a more important question, what is UNC missing that they had in the 80s and early 90s? Do we lack recruiting? Facilities? Brand?

You could make this same argument about Georgia football before they hired Kirby Smart. Just because they had underperformed for decades doesn't mean that there program is incapable of becoming elite again. There is nothing structurally about UNC that prevents them from being as elite as Maryland, Duke or UVA.

What is UNC missing? An anachronistic legacy smoke filled room system with a smaller competitive pool of programs. ND, OSU, Duke and GT were all irrelevant when UNC was last regularly making quarters. That’s 200 kids who might’ve gone to UNC. Even if they only pulled 2% of the exception ones from those programs and stick them on UNCs current team and project the difference. Not to mention academics have become harder notwithstanding the gross grade inflation colleges have succumbed to the last 40yrs.

Comparing lacrosse to FBS football is insane. Literally. And having moved to GA a dozen or so years ago and having a in low balls deep at Tech on inside info you would not like how UGA got there. Would make the test taking / paper writing scandal look like a 20yr old throwing a legged in his dorm room. This is the kindest things you can find on UGA football (setting aside the mass arrests regularly, guy who killed a girl after the championship game drag racing in a small town street drunk etc)

https://247sports.com/LongFormArticle/C ... 173848072/

I think the question is, why is it only impacting UNC? UNC is still recruiting at a very high level… there facilities are top notch… no reason why UNC should settle for anything less than Duke/UVA/Maryland. If UNC wasn’t recruiting well, I would say, maybe they your point makes sense about other programs taking away top talent. But the 3 (Duke/uva/Maryland) are still dominating most years, and we recruit as well as them. But we are the exception when it comes to on field success.

[MDlaxfan76]

This may have been answered before, some pages back, but what coach was available who projects to be significantly superior to Breschi?

We were not surprised by Tillman, it was pretty darn clear that he was going to take Harvard to the top of the Ivies had he stayed, and the jump to UMD was a coup for them and him. Likewise, when Shea turned UVA down, Tiffany was clearly ascendant in the Ivies and nationally and brought his whole staff with him, an obvious fit for the situation.

Who really projects the way either of those guys did?

From a practical perspective, who is perhaps available in 3 years?

[Lewisfrederick]

UNC is an elite program that has won 5 National Championships with 3 different head coaches and been to 14 Final Fours in 4 different decades. UNC has been one of the most elite programs in the country every year since 1976, with the exception of a 10 year stretch from 1997-2006 and the last 7 years since 2017.
I hate it when people act like these last 7 seasons is the historical norm at UNC. From 1976-1996, UNC was a top 3 program in the country. We struggled from 1997-2006, however lets not act like that decade should be viewed as the standard. From 2007-2016 UNC was a top 5-8 program in the country again. Since 2017 we have fallen drastically.

Here is UNC's NCAA tournament seed every year since 1976. I will be the first to admit tournament seeding is not perfect, but I hate it when people say UNC was only an elite program for a decade. Cause that simply isn't true.

1976 - 5 Seed
1977 - 7 Seed
1978 - N/A
1979 - N/A
1980 - 5 Seed
1981 - 2 Seed
1982 - 1 Seed
1983 - 5 Seed
1984 - 5 Seed
1985 - 3 Seed
1986 - 5 Seed
1987 - 5 Seed
1988 - 3 Seed
1989 - 6 Seed
1990 - 4 Seed
1991 - 1 Seed
1992 - 2 Seed
1993 - 1 Seed
1994 - 4 Seed
1995 - Unseeded
1996 - 4 Seed
1997 - N/A
1998 - Unseeded
1999 - N/A
2000 - N/A
2001 - N/A
2002 - N/A
2003 - N/A
2004 - 8 Seed
2005 - N/A
2006 - N/A
2007 - 8 Seed
2008 - 4 Seed
2009 - 6 Seed
2010 - 4 Seed
2011 - 8 Seed
2012 - 8 Seed
2013 - 5 Seed
2014 - Unseeded
2015 - 3 Seed
2016 - Unseeded
2017 - Unseeded
2018 - N/A
2019 - N/A
2021 - 1 Seed
2022 - N/A
2023 - N/A

Many UNC fans rightfully don't believe we should be settling for the standard set the last 7 years when we are clearly capable of being better then that.

So the exception being 17 of the last 25yrs right? You’ve carved out 68% of the most current and contemporary quarter century from your analysis. I have to ask, do you work in commercial title or trade credit insurance?

17 of the last 45 years. And the last 7 seasons, we had just as much talent as any program in the country. I would say maybe you have a point regarding our inability to compete if we weren’t still consistently bringing in so many elite recruits. Heck, JB couldn’t bring us to the tournament when he had Chris Gray as a 5th year senior and the Number 1 recruiting class in the country!

Wearing Carolina Blue didn’t prevent UNC from going to the tournament, being out-coached and out worked did. There is nothing structural about Carolina that we should be this far behind UM/UVA/Duke. Heck look at the UNC women’s program and how much they’ve dominated the last decade. I know it isn’t apples to apples, but at UNC you have arguably the best women’s program in the country. Is there some massive advantage that the women have that the men don’t at UNC? And if so does it explain how one makes the final 4 almost every year (in a much larger field) while the other rolls over and plays dead the moment they step on the field against strong conference opponents?

[jrn19]

This may have been answered before, some pages back, but what coach was available who projects to be significantly superior to Breschi?

We were not surprised by Tillman, it was pretty darn clear that he was going to take Harvard to the top of the Ivies had he stayed, and the jump to UMD was a coup for them and him. Likewise, when Shea turned UVA down, Tiffany was clearly ascendant in the Ivies and nationally and brought his whole staff with him, an obvious fit for the situation.

Who really projects the way either of those guys did?

From a practical perspective, who is perhaps available in 3 years?

Madalon just took Princeton to its first Final Four in nearly 20 years and followed it up with an Ivy Championship despite having half of his starters out with injuries the entire season. Recruits at an exceptionally high level. He looks like he's building something pretty strong there for the long haul and the Ivy League has been where MD, UVA, Hopkins went for their hire. I'd have made a run at him

I'm not sure what his level of comfortability is at Delaware, but Ben DeLuca has been to the tournament 4 times in 8 years as a coach and has 1 Final Four, 2 Quarterfinals (one as a 2 seed, one upsetting a 2 seed), and nearly beat the #1 seed in the other. He took Delaware from being the cellar dweller of the CAA to dominating the conference and competing for 60 mins with the best teams in the tournament in the span of 3 years and he has successful experience at a big program from his time at Cornell.

Those would be my first two calls.

[HopFan16]

This may have been answered before, some pages back, but what coach was available who projects to be significantly superior to Breschi?

This is like if the Rams kept Mr. Mediocrity Jeff Fisher solely because there wasn't necessarily a blindingly obvious candidate out there to replace him. They would have never found Sean McVay and might still be going 7-9 every season to this day.

Also maybe Tillman's talent was clear to you but it was not to the majority of the lacrosse world, nor was he widely considered to be a "significantly superior" option than Cottle at the time. He was 20-19 in three seasons, never finished better than 4th in the Ivy, and quite frankly his time at Harvard success-wise was not substantially better than Anderson's last few years there. It was a bit of a leap of faith by the Terps to hire him and it paid off. There are guys out there who might be the next Tillman or at least Tillman-lite but you have to give them a shot. Madalon isn't a bad thought — on top of his recent track record he also has a family connection to UNC.

[wgdsr]

lewis and bryan,
you got what u wanted, or part of it. a 3 year extension, breschi's on the clock. maybe some combo of duffy/petro/egan are part of what put them on the trajectory you want. defense has been more buttoned up. guess we'll see about assistants.

[jrn19]

which begs the question, why are you putting a coach "on the clock." Was he not on the clock already when he walked into a contract year without a new deal and then went 7-7? How do you reasonably expect him to recruit when all of his peers have long term deals and the next class he's recruiting (Class of 2025) will be incoming freshmen...the last year of his deal. "Come play to UNC where I may or may not even be the coach by that point. If they don't think he's a long term option, then just make the move.

[Farfromgeneva]

UNC is an elite program that has won 5 National Championships with 3 different head coaches and been to 14 Final Fours in 4 different decades. UNC has been one of the most elite programs in the country every year since 1976, with the exception of a 10 year stretch from 1997-2006 and the last 7 years since 2017.
I hate it when people act like these last 7 seasons is the historical norm at UNC. From 1976-1996, UNC was a top 3 program in the country. We struggled from 1997-2006, however lets not act like that decade should be viewed as the standard. From 2007-2016 UNC was a top 5-8 program in the country again. Since 2017 we have fallen drastically.

Here is UNC's NCAA tournament seed every year since 1976. I will be the first to admit tournament seeding is not perfect, but I hate it when people say UNC was only an elite program for a decade. Cause that simply isn't true.

1976 - 5 Seed
1977 - 7 Seed
1978 - N/A
1979 - N/A
1980 - 5 Seed
1981 - 2 Seed
1982 - 1 Seed
1983 - 5 Seed
1984 - 5 Seed
1985 - 3 Seed
1986 - 5 Seed
1987 - 5 Seed
1988 - 3 Seed
1989 - 6 Seed
1990 - 4 Seed
1991 - 1 Seed
1992 - 2 Seed
1993 - 1 Seed
1994 - 4 Seed
1995 - Unseeded
1996 - 4 Seed
1997 - N/A
1998 - Unseeded
1999 - N/A
2000 - N/A
2001 - N/A
2002 - N/A
2003 - N/A
2004 - 8 Seed
2005 - N/A
2006 - N/A
2007 - 8 Seed
2008 - 4 Seed
2009 - 6 Seed
2010 - 4 Seed
2011 - 8 Seed
2012 - 8 Seed
2013 - 5 Seed
2014 - Unseeded
2015 - 3 Seed
2016 - Unseeded
2017 - Unseeded
2018 - N/A
2019 - N/A
2021 - 1 Seed
2022 - N/A
2023 - N/A

Many UNC fans rightfully don't believe we should be settling for the standard set the last 7 years when we are clearly capable of being better then that.

So the exception being 17 of the last 25yrs right? You’ve carved out 68% of the most current and contemporary quarter century from your analysis. I have to ask, do you work in commercial title or trade credit insurance?

17 of the last 45 years. And the last 7 seasons, we had just as much talent as any program in the country. I would say maybe you have a point regarding our inability to compete if we weren’t still consistently bringing in so many elite recruits. Heck, JB couldn’t bring us to the tournament when he had Chris Gray as a 5th year senior and the Number 1 recruiting class in the country!

Wearing Carolina Blue didn’t prevent UNC from going to the tournament, being out-coached and out worked did. There is nothing structural about Carolina that we should be this far behind UM/UVA/Duke. Heck look at the UNC women’s program and how much they’ve dominated the last decade. I know it isn’t apples to apples, but at UNC you have arguably the best women’s program in the country. Is there some massive advantage that the women have that the men don’t at UNC? And if so does it explain how one makes the final 4 almost every year (in a much larger field) while the other rolls over and plays dead the moment they step on the field against strong conference opponents?

No it’s 17/25 the way you presented it and reality. Ignoring the change from 12 member playoff and auto byes into quarters and calling it the same accomplishment and ignoring the rise of 3-4 comparable institutions over that period makes the case pointless. Army should be top 5 in football because they were good in the 1940s by your logic.

[Farfromgeneva]

"Breschi is on par with Corrigan"

Since Breschi got to Carolina (2009), here is the track record between Carolina and Notre Dame

Championships
UNC: 1
ND: 0

Final Fours
UNC: 2
ND: 5

Quarterfinals
UNC: 6
ND: 11

NCAA Tournament appearances
UNC: 10
ND: 13

NCAA Tournament wins
UNC: 10
ND: 18

Winning percentage
UNC: 66.5%
ND: 70.5%

Conference record since 2014 when ND joined ACC
UNC: 17-26
ND: 26-17

H2H: 9-6 Notre Dame

Since Breschi's championship, Corrigan has 4 Quarterfinals to Breschi's 1, 4 NCAA Tournament wins to Breschi's 2, 5 NCAA Tournaments to Breschi's 2, and the H2H is 5-3 Notre Dame. Breschi has made the Final Four once and Corrigan hasn't since 2015

Those...don't look like two coaches on par to me. That looks like one coach is clearly better than the other. If you want to say Breschi has proved he can win a championship and Corrigan has not, fair, but...why isn't he winning nearly as much? If we're doing the 25 year trend and history thing, wasn't like Notre Dame was making a ton of Final Fours 25 years ago. It's not like Notre Dame is far easier to recruit to than North Carolina. Not like admissions standards are different there or anything. And yet one guy has more than double the Final Fours, almost double the Quarterfinals, almost double the NCAAT wins, and is way better in the same league.

Listen, if Carolina believes that it's not at the level of Syracuse, Maryland, Hopkins, Virginia, or Duke in terms of what it's able to achieve, then I certainly understand keeping Breschi. But Breschi himself has achieved far more than what he's been doing the last 6-7 years and is no longer doing that. He still recruits at a very, very high level; the school recruits itself. And Maryland was told a lot of these same things when they let go of Cottle. That the track record was what it was, Maryland was a Quarterfinal program not a Final Four or Championship one, you're making a mistake giving up on the sure thing. Does that mean UNC would get the same results as MD did? Of course not. But just because UNC wasn't good with John Haus - who's record is very similar to Breschi's over the last 6-7 years - doesn't mean they can't achieve more. We've seen them do it very recently. And admitting to your fans that you don't view yourselves on par with those schools...probably isn't going to sit well with the fans.

There's no guarantee a new coach would have been the right move and if they didn't have a good name in mind to go after, yeah, certainly reasons to keep Breschi. But it's not hard to see where UNC fans' frustration comes from. They haven't been anywhere near as good as their rivals for 6-7 years and the school just said we're okay with that. Or...maybe they aren't, because they gave him a 3 year deal and not 5, so they are going to need to give him a new contract again in 2 years and are sending him out there to recruit high school players with no contract that guarantees he will be there for the duration of their college career. In which case, if you aren't confident enough in him long term to give him a 5 year deal...why are you extending him? The way it played out, I get where some UNC fans would want a change. Doesn't mean it would have worked out. There are no guarantees.

No to the bolded. That would be incorrect. And I never heard anyone say that abide MD when Cottle was going. He performed better than Breschi before getting pushed out as well. Not even comparable .

Notre Dame made a final four in 2001 for the first time, when there were first round hues before it expanded to 16 in 2003. Then didn’t see a final four again until 2010. They didn’t even make another quarterfinal from 2001-2008.

Frustration doesn’t mean make potential existential change. I get frustrated with my elementary aged children but I don’t give them up for adoption or try to trade with the hot mom down the block. Just because someone pushed back in firing the guy doesn’t mean they don’t understand frustration in being a fan and not getting the results they want. Some of the leaps to conclusions and logic just fails here.

People absolutely said this when Maryland fired Cottle. Bill Tierney wrote a column in Inside Lacrosse talking about how crazy it was. Here’s what Patrick Stevens wrote at the time.

“Maryland was a Quarterfinal team on an annual basis under Cottle, and a little better in the second half of Edell’s time in College Park. 30 years is a pretty decent sample size. And at some point after the players, coaches, and administrators come and go, the onus has to fall on something as faceless as the institution.”

Then he said if Tillman won 70% of his games, and reaches a Final Four every 3 to 4 years, it will be time for “those who shunned a serious examination of the program vis-a-vis the consistent title contenders in the last month to reconsider their perspective of Maryland lacrosse.”

That’s pretty much exactly telling Maryland that your history is what you are, and this wasn’t on the coach you got rid of, it’s on you, and when the next guy you brought in to replace him does the same thing…blame yourselves.

Frustration maybe may not mean make change, but you don’t just keep a coach for the sake of keeping a coach either because of another coach’s results from 20 years ago or because it’s a “non revenue sport.” Examine the pluses and minuses of the job, what you can expect to accomplish if a coach is fully maximizing all of the benefits of the job, and then decide if the current coach is meeting that standard and expectation or if someone else would do a better job. If being in the basement of the ACC behind Duke, UVA, and Notre Dame and being a borderline Top 20 team with one great season in there is the standard at UNC or there’s no one out there that can do better, then keep Breschi. That’s the decision UNC made. It’s not the decision Cuse, Hopkins, UVA, or Maryland made. But lacrosse is a different priority at those schools. And I don’t think borderline Top 20 over 7 years is the level UNC should be at when you consider the conference they’re in, the recruits that they’re able to bring in, and both their recent and long term history. It suggests they’re closer to Top 10 or Quarterfinal level. That hasn’t been what they’ve achieved. They decided Breschi is the most likely to get back there. We’ll see if they’re right. But they definitely didn’t set him up for success by giving him a contract that will have Lars Tiffany going to every recruit and saying “UNC doesn’t even trust this guy enough to give him a contract that lasts long enough for him to be your coach for your whole career.” Which smells a lot like keeping a coach for the sake of it. I don’t think that’s any better a decision than choosing to move on. They could have moved on or made clear he’s their guy long term. They chose neither.

But it seems like any answer given here that’s not keep the guy is met with “not understanding logic” or whatever so I’ll dip out here

So everyone was saying that? Including the players and alums I knowZ. Squeaky wheel, as WG stated, does not reflect everyone or even a plurality.

There are numerous leaps to conclusion absent steps in logic here - speculation.

These binary outcomes you force vs a spectrum make it useless when it just pivots and doesn’t acknowledge those elapse and the fact a spectrum of outcomes exist. P

[Farfromgeneva]

UNC is an elite program that has won 5 National Championships with 3 different head coaches and been to 14 Final Fours in 4 different decades. UNC has been one of the most elite programs in the country every year since 1976, with the exception of a 10 year stretch from 1997-2006 and the last 7 years since 2017.
I hate it when people act like these last 7 seasons is the historical norm at UNC. From 1976-1996, UNC was a top 3 program in the country. We struggled from 1997-2006, however lets not act like that decade should be viewed as the standard. From 2007-2016 UNC was a top 5-8 program in the country again. Since 2017 we have fallen drastically.

Here is UNC's NCAA tournament seed every year since 1976. I will be the first to admit tournament seeding is not perfect, but I hate it when people say UNC was only an elite program for a decade. Cause that simply isn't true.

1976 - 5 Seed
1977 - 7 Seed
1978 - N/A
1979 - N/A
1980 - 5 Seed
1981 - 2 Seed
1982 - 1 Seed
1983 - 5 Seed
1984 - 5 Seed
1985 - 3 Seed
1986 - 5 Seed
1987 - 5 Seed
1988 - 3 Seed
1989 - 6 Seed
1990 - 4 Seed
1991 - 1 Seed
1992 - 2 Seed
1993 - 1 Seed
1994 - 4 Seed
1995 - Unseeded
1996 - 4 Seed
1997 - N/A
1998 - Unseeded
1999 - N/A
2000 - N/A
2001 - N/A
2002 - N/A
2003 - N/A
2004 - 8 Seed
2005 - N/A
2006 - N/A
2007 - 8 Seed
2008 - 4 Seed
2009 - 6 Seed
2010 - 4 Seed
2011 - 8 Seed
2012 - 8 Seed
2013 - 5 Seed
2014 - Unseeded
2015 - 3 Seed
2016 - Unseeded
2017 - Unseeded
2018 - N/A
2019 - N/A
2021 - 1 Seed
2022 - N/A
2023 - N/A

Many UNC fans rightfully don't believe we should be settling for the standard set the last 7 years when we are clearly capable of being better then that.

So the exception being 17 of the last 25yrs right? You’ve carved out 68% of the most current and contemporary quarter century from your analysis. I have to ask, do you work in commercial title or trade credit insurance?

17 of the last 45 years. And the last 7 seasons, we had just as much talent as any program in the country. I would say maybe you have a point regarding our inability to compete if we weren’t still consistently bringing in so many elite recruits. Heck, JB couldn’t bring us to the tournament when he had Chris Gray as a 5th year senior and the Number 1 recruiting class in the country!

Wearing Carolina Blue didn’t prevent UNC from going to the tournament, being out-coached and out worked did. There is nothing structural about Carolina that we should be this far behind UM/UVA/Duke. Heck look at the UNC women’s program and how much they’ve dominated the last decade. I know it isn’t apples to apples, but at UNC you have arguably the best women’s program in the country. Is there some massive advantage that the women have that the men don’t at UNC? And if so does it explain how one makes the final 4 almost every year (in a much larger field) while the other rolls over and plays dead the moment they step on the field against strong conference opponents?

I recall Georgetown had a #1 class led by a midfielder who was barely above average. That doesn’t mean it’s the best class.

Please explain what makes women’s and men’s lacrosse comparable behind the name lacrosse.

[Farfromgeneva]

Everyone where seems to think they’d be better running an athletics department than the professionals doing it.

Rebuttal: “it’s a forum for fans of course we do that’s what this is for”, but then want the credibility of peer reviewed experts. (Ok then I take it all with the value it deserves)

[MDlaxfan76]

This may have been answered before, some pages back, but what coach was available who projects to be significantly superior to Breschi?

We were not surprised by Tillman, it was pretty darn clear that he was going to take Harvard to the top of the Ivies had he stayed, and the jump to UMD was a coup for them and him. Likewise, when Shea turned UVA down, Tiffany was clearly ascendant in the Ivies and nationally and brought his whole staff with him, an obvious fit for the situation.

Who really projects the way either of those guys did?

From a practical perspective, who is perhaps available in 3 years?

Madalon just took Princeton to its first Final Four in nearly 20 years and followed it up with an Ivy Championship despite having half of his starters out with injuries the entire season. Recruits at an exceptionally high level. He looks like he's building something pretty strong there for the long haul and the Ivy League has been where MD, UVA, Hopkins went for their hire. I'd have made a run at him

I'm not sure what his level of comfortability is at Delaware, but Ben DeLuca has been to the tournament 4 times in 8 years as a coach and has 1 Final Four, 2 Quarterfinals (one as a 2 seed, one upsetting a 2 seed), and nearly beat the #1 seed in the other. He took Delaware from being the cellar dweller of the CAA to dominating the conference and competing for 60 mins with the best teams in the tournament in the span of 3 years and he has successful experience at a big program from his time at Cornell.

Those would be my first two calls.

Madalon a legit possibility. That's a good pitch.
DeLuca, no. IMO.

[MDlaxfan76]

This may have been answered before, some pages back, but what coach was available who projects to be significantly superior to Breschi?

This is like if the Rams kept Mr. Mediocrity Jeff Fisher solely because there wasn't necessarily a blindingly obvious candidate out there to replace him. They would have never found Sean McVay and might still be going 7-9 every season to this day.

Also maybe Tillman's talent was clear to you but it was not to the majority of the lacrosse world, nor was he widely considered to be a "significantly superior" option than Cottle at the time. He was 20-19 in three seasons, never finished better than 4th in the Ivy, and quite frankly his time at Harvard success-wise was not substantially better than Anderson's last few years there. It was a bit of a leap of faith by the Terps to hire him and it paid off. There are guys out there who might be the next Tillman or at least Tillman-lite but you have to give them a shot. Madalon isn't a bad thought — on top of his recent track record he also has a family connection to UNC.

mmm, I think Tillman was recruiting extremely well and expectations were super high...but that was from an Ivy perspective. I also think he was well known as a 'character guy'. I don't know him personally, but I recall that was the word on him...

I do agree that Cottle wasn't an easy situation; as I said earlier, UMD is the other school beyond Hopkins that might be described as "impatient" about championships.

But the choice of Tillman was met with a bunch of expectations right away from those in the recruiting circuit at the time.