Like ND, Cuse, Princeton, and Cornell in to be top-5 contenders in the early season.
Notre Dame has been organized and efficient for the past few years, and Chris Kavanaugh looks poised to lead the offense. For Cuse, I really like their offense and they don't need to get better on defense given the losses so many of their competitors are suffering. As for Princeton and Cornell, each has enough returning pieces and coaching success to compete for the IL championship next year. I'd almost add Yale, but many here think Brandau was the best lacrosse player this year, so they couldn't possibly overcome his loss.
Also considering: Duke, Maryland, and UVA.
Duke always seems to reload and the portal benefits them as much as anyone. The talent will be there even if the early season performance will not.
I'm less sold on Maryland. Losing Wierman and Ajax are huge pieces for this team. The offense doesn't look to markedly improve and will see fewer possessions without the human cheat code that has been Wierman for this recent Maryland run. I think Maryland less succeeded than Duke and UVA melted down this year, and next year will test my theory.
UVA has two separate issues. The defense is talented on ball but couldn't slide correctly to save its life. That can be fixed, although I don't expect Lars to get it straight given the run of mediocre defenses during his Charlottesville tenure. The offense loses a ton, but there is an argument that UVA has enough talent in the pipeline to reload. Of these three, I'm most skeptical of UVA returning to top-5 status. In particular, the pipeline seems two years away from bearing fruit. UVA could be a monster in '26 and '27, however.