Ivy League 2025

[The Orfling]

I assume that the USILA will be making award announcements quite soon. As a note, Matt Brandau has been named Yale's Male Athlete of the Year, as well as New England Men's Lacrosse Player of the Year.

I would love to see Matt Brandau win one of the USILA awards, although if they also are also based in part on the postseason, that may be a non-starter. The award he won for the best male athlete in the senior class is pretty special – there are only something like five major awards (academic/service/athletic) announced as part of the commencement festivities, and to have the award announced in real time to an audience of classmates and families is a great moment. Congratulations to Matt on a great career.

[sanelaxparent]

One big X Factor going forward for Ivy league Athletics is going to be the imminent return to standardized testing for these schools. I'm pretty familiar with how the academic requirements for the Ancient 8 have 'evolved' over the past 5 years. The significant relaxation of academic benchmarks for prospective students with Covid has been a huge boon for the coaches, who have had a field day recruiting players who were previously inadmissable. 90% of high school students these days (especially in the lacrosse world) seem to have a 4.0 GPA. 'Score Optional' has made all these prospects eligible for Ivy League admission, where before they would have had to hit a minimum ACT or SAT score for admission depending on where they fell in the priority spectrum for the academic index.
Past few months have seen major academic institutions changing course on scores. Several Ivies have reinstituted them, more will go like dominoes. There is no other proven metric of whether a student can 'do the work'. Sure there will be an impact on recruiting.

[CU77]

Astute point.

[renault]

One big X Factor going forward for Ivy league Athletics is going to be the imminent return to standardized testing for these schools. I'm pretty familiar with how the academic requirements for the Ancient 8 have 'evolved' over the past 5 years. The significant relaxation of academic benchmarks for prospective students with Covid has been a huge boon for the coaches, who have had a field day recruiting players who were previously inadmissable. 90% of high school students these days (especially in the lacrosse world) seem to have a 4.0 GPA. 'Score Optional' has made all these prospects eligible for Ivy League admission, where before they would have had to hit a minimum ACT or SAT score for admission depending on where they fell in the priority spectrum for the academic index.
Past few months have seen major academic institutions changing course on scores. Several Ivies have reinstituted them, more will go like dominoes. There is no other proven metric of whether a student can 'do the work'. Sure there will be an impact on recruiting.

I'd read somewhere that many of the teams/schools still required test scores for athletes even as the schools themselves went test-optional.

Have recruited athletes not been submitting test scores since 2020? Has anyone here gone through this process recently?

[DA/PU]

Terps doing to uva what they did to Princeton. Elite fogo and goalie, top dman, plus shooters getting hot is a dangerous recipe. Tillman best coach in the game. Maybe takes a bit of the sting off the really tough opening round game for PU. Crazy turnaround for Terps. Looking forward to seeing the young Ivy teams mature next year.

[The Orfling]

Terps doing to uva what they did to Princeton. Elite fogo and goalie, top dman, plus shooters getting hot is a dangerous recipe. Tillman best coach in the game. Maybe takes a bit of the sting off the really tough opening round game for PU. Crazy turnaround for Terps. Looking forward to seeing the young Ivy teams mature next year.

I was thinking all those same things. Gosh is Tillman a fantastic coach. Lots to look forward to in the Ivy league next year as well.

[Gobigred]

Coda's point about defense is the correct one. The defense has seriously cost Yale from further tournament runs for 3 years now, and it hurt Cornell this year. Ivy league ranks in defensive efficiency

Princeton: 4th
Penn: 12th
Brown: 27th
Harvard: 31st
Dartmouth: 47th
Cornell: 48th
Yale: 53rd

All 5 ACC teams ranked in the Top 15. 4 Big Ten teams ranked in the Top 10; and Rutgers and Michigan were 30th and 33rd; still ahead of Cornell and Yale. Georgetown and Denver were Top 20.

Harvard has been unable to put together a consistent defense to buoy the offense. Cornell I think just got hit very hard by personnel losses and will be improved next year with experience/health. Yale is the one that demands the most questions. The last 3 years 53rd, 52nd, and 49th in efficiency; they were 40th before the season shut down in 2020 and 33rd in 2019. The last time they even had a Top 30 defense was....the year they won the national championship. And it hasn't just been because of goalie play which was down this year; Paquette was >50% in 2021 and 2022. Something is wrong there and you can see it on tape as well, their slide/recoveries are just bad.

The good news is the offenses will likely remain strong and have lots of talent. Princeton obviously looks most promising with all the young talent coming back, but need to replace Gianforcaro. I think next year will be a year of more evenness across the country and we probably see at least 1 Ivy in the Quarterfinals. Anything further is down to who wins on that day

Won't argue with the numbers, but two ACC defenses looked like sieves against Cornell and a third was riddled by Penn. A fourth was shredded yesterday by a Maryland team not known this year for its offense.

[jrn19]

Coda's point about defense is the correct one. The defense has seriously cost Yale from further tournament runs for 3 years now, and it hurt Cornell this year. Ivy league ranks in defensive efficiency

Princeton: 4th
Penn: 12th
Brown: 27th
Harvard: 31st
Dartmouth: 47th
Cornell: 48th
Yale: 53rd

All 5 ACC teams ranked in the Top 15. 4 Big Ten teams ranked in the Top 10; and Rutgers and Michigan were 30th and 33rd; still ahead of Cornell and Yale. Georgetown and Denver were Top 20.

Harvard has been unable to put together a consistent defense to buoy the offense. Cornell I think just got hit very hard by personnel losses and will be improved next year with experience/health. Yale is the one that demands the most questions. The last 3 years 53rd, 52nd, and 49th in efficiency; they were 40th before the season shut down in 2020 and 33rd in 2019. The last time they even had a Top 30 defense was....the year they won the national championship. And it hasn't just been because of goalie play which was down this year; Paquette was >50% in 2021 and 2022. Something is wrong there and you can see it on tape as well, their slide/recoveries are just bad.

The good news is the offenses will likely remain strong and have lots of talent. Princeton obviously looks most promising with all the young talent coming back, but need to replace Gianforcaro. I think next year will be a year of more evenness across the country and we probably see at least 1 Ivy in the Quarterfinals. Anything further is down to who wins on that day

Won't argue with the numbers, but two ACC defenses looked like sieves against Cornell and a third was riddled by Penn. A fourth was shredded yesterday by a Maryland team not known this year for its offense.

Cornell's offense is awesome. They're going to score on most teams. Problem isn't giving up goals to great teams, which happens. But Cornell had games where their defense just didn't give them a shot (Penn State) and where they scored plenty of goals to win a game and their defense still let them down (Denver, ND.) It'll have to be better if they wanna get back to the Final Four

[Gobigred]

Coda's point about defense is the correct one. The defense has seriously cost Yale from further tournament runs for 3 years now, and it hurt Cornell this year. Ivy league ranks in defensive efficiency

Princeton: 4th
Penn: 12th
Brown: 27th
Harvard: 31st
Dartmouth: 47th
Cornell: 48th
Yale: 53rd

All 5 ACC teams ranked in the Top 15. 4 Big Ten teams ranked in the Top 10; and Rutgers and Michigan were 30th and 33rd; still ahead of Cornell and Yale. Georgetown and Denver were Top 20.

Harvard has been unable to put together a consistent defense to buoy the offense. Cornell I think just got hit very hard by personnel losses and will be improved next year with experience/health. Yale is the one that demands the most questions. The last 3 years 53rd, 52nd, and 49th in efficiency; they were 40th before the season shut down in 2020 and 33rd in 2019. The last time they even had a Top 30 defense was....the year they won the national championship. And it hasn't just been because of goalie play which was down this year; Paquette was >50% in 2021 and 2022. Something is wrong there and you can see it on tape as well, their slide/recoveries are just bad.

The good news is the offenses will likely remain strong and have lots of talent. Princeton obviously looks most promising with all the young talent coming back, but need to replace Gianforcaro. I think next year will be a year of more evenness across the country and we probably see at least 1 Ivy in the Quarterfinals. Anything further is down to who wins on that day

Won't argue with the numbers, but two ACC defenses looked like sieves against Cornell and a third was riddled by Penn. A fourth was shredded yesterday by a Maryland team not known this year for its offense.

Cornell's offense is awesome. They're going to score on most teams. Problem isn't giving up goals to great teams, which happens. But Cornell had games where their defense just didn't give them a shot (Penn State) and where they scored plenty of goals to win a game and their defense still let them down (Denver, ND.) It'll have to be better if they wanna get back to the Final Four

Where did I say anything to the contrary? My point was that the vaunted ACC defenses didn't look so hot against Ivies or an offense-challenged Maryland.

[jrn19]

Coda's point about defense is the correct one. The defense has seriously cost Yale from further tournament runs for 3 years now, and it hurt Cornell this year. Ivy league ranks in defensive efficiency

Princeton: 4th
Penn: 12th
Brown: 27th
Harvard: 31st
Dartmouth: 47th
Cornell: 48th
Yale: 53rd

All 5 ACC teams ranked in the Top 15. 4 Big Ten teams ranked in the Top 10; and Rutgers and Michigan were 30th and 33rd; still ahead of Cornell and Yale. Georgetown and Denver were Top 20.

Harvard has been unable to put together a consistent defense to buoy the offense. Cornell I think just got hit very hard by personnel losses and will be improved next year with experience/health. Yale is the one that demands the most questions. The last 3 years 53rd, 52nd, and 49th in efficiency; they were 40th before the season shut down in 2020 and 33rd in 2019. The last time they even had a Top 30 defense was....the year they won the national championship. And it hasn't just been because of goalie play which was down this year; Paquette was >50% in 2021 and 2022. Something is wrong there and you can see it on tape as well, their slide/recoveries are just bad.

The good news is the offenses will likely remain strong and have lots of talent. Princeton obviously looks most promising with all the young talent coming back, but need to replace Gianforcaro. I think next year will be a year of more evenness across the country and we probably see at least 1 Ivy in the Quarterfinals. Anything further is down to who wins on that day

Won't argue with the numbers, but two ACC defenses looked like sieves against Cornell and a third was riddled by Penn. A fourth was shredded yesterday by a Maryland team not known this year for its offense.

Cornell's offense is awesome. They're going to score on most teams. Problem isn't giving up goals to great teams, which happens. But Cornell had games where their defense just didn't give them a shot (Penn State) and where they scored plenty of goals to win a game and their defense still let them down (Denver, ND.) It'll have to be better if they wanna get back to the Final Four

Where did I say anything to the contrary? My point was that the vaunted ACC defenses didn't look so hot against Ivies or an offense-challenged Maryland.

I never said they were "vaunted." I said they were Top 15, which was enough with their offenses to get to the Quarterfinals and Final Four. Virginia held Hopkins to 0 goals in the 4Q and overtimes. Notre Dame's defense has given up 26 goals in the tournament.

If Cornell's defense was as good as those teams, maybe they'd still be playing instead of missing the tournament

[Gobigred]

Coda's point about defense is the correct one. The defense has seriously cost Yale from further tournament runs for 3 years now, and it hurt Cornell this year. Ivy league ranks in defensive efficiency

Princeton: 4th
Penn: 12th
Brown: 27th
Harvard: 31st
Dartmouth: 47th
Cornell: 48th
Yale: 53rd

All 5 ACC teams ranked in the Top 15. 4 Big Ten teams ranked in the Top 10; and Rutgers and Michigan were 30th and 33rd; still ahead of Cornell and Yale. Georgetown and Denver were Top 20.

Harvard has been unable to put together a consistent defense to buoy the offense. Cornell I think just got hit very hard by personnel losses and will be improved next year with experience/health. Yale is the one that demands the most questions. The last 3 years 53rd, 52nd, and 49th in efficiency; they were 40th before the season shut down in 2020 and 33rd in 2019. The last time they even had a Top 30 defense was....the year they won the national championship. And it hasn't just been because of goalie play which was down this year; Paquette was >50% in 2021 and 2022. Something is wrong there and you can see it on tape as well, their slide/recoveries are just bad.

The good news is the offenses will likely remain strong and have lots of talent. Princeton obviously looks most promising with all the young talent coming back, but need to replace Gianforcaro. I think next year will be a year of more evenness across the country and we probably see at least 1 Ivy in the Quarterfinals. Anything further is down to who wins on that day

Won't argue with the numbers, but two ACC defenses looked like sieves against Cornell and a third was riddled by Penn. A fourth was shredded yesterday by a Maryland team not known this year for its offense.

Cornell's offense is awesome. They're going to score on most teams. Problem isn't giving up goals to great teams, which happens. But Cornell had games where their defense just didn't give them a shot (Penn State) and where they scored plenty of goals to win a game and their defense still let them down (Denver, ND.) It'll have to be better if they wanna get back to the Final Four

Where did I say anything to the contrary? My point was that the vaunted ACC defenses didn't look so hot against Ivies or an offense-challenged Maryland.

I never said they were "vaunted." I said they were Top 15, which was enough with their offenses to get to the Quarterfinals and Final Four. Virginia held Hopkins to 0 goals in the 4Q and overtimes. Notre Dame's defense has given up 26 goals in the tournament.

If Cornell's defense was as good as those teams, maybe they'd still be playing instead of missing the tournament

Your reading comprehension skills are lacking. I clarified. You still failed to understand.

[FannOLax]

I like the coaching overhaul being made by Brown and the hiring of Ajax Zapitello by Dartmouth. After a disappointing end to the 2024 season, the Ivies in 2025 face one final year of seeing their graduates play for ACC and Big 10 teams. For Yale fans, that will mean seeing Monfort and 2024 Eli captain Hackler in Hop colors. Can Yale stay healthy and finally get its defensive house back in order? Can Princeton find another top goalie and mature into being a true national contender? What does Cornell need to do to get back into the NCAA tourney? How many Ivies can make it to the 2025 dance? Will the regular-season champ again host the ILT? Or Columbia? Here's looking forward to fall ball (and especially to seeing Yale's incoming goalie).

[faircornell]

One big X Factor going forward for Ivy league Athletics is going to be the imminent return to standardized testing for these schools. I'm pretty familiar with how the academic requirements for the Ancient 8 have 'evolved' over the past 5 years. The significant relaxation of academic benchmarks for prospective students with Covid has been a huge boon for the coaches, who have had a field day recruiting players who were previously inadmissable. 90% of high school students these days (especially in the lacrosse world) seem to have a 4.0 GPA. 'Score Optional' has made all these prospects eligible for Ivy League admission, where before they would have had to hit a minimum ACT or SAT score for admission depending on where they fell in the priority spectrum for the academic index.
Past few months have seen major academic institutions changing course on scores. Several Ivies have reinstituted them, more will go like dominoes. There is no other proven metric of whether a student can 'do the work'. Sure there will be an impact on recruiting.

I'd read somewhere that many of the teams/schools still required test scores for athletes even as the schools themselves went test-optional.

Have recruited athletes not been submitting test scores since 2020? Has anyone here gone through this process recently?

I had a few family friends go through the process this year, and they submitted test scores. I could be wrong, but I believe that the NCAA requires SAT scores for athletes to register for recruiting.