2022 D3 NCAA Tournament Bracket

[InsiderRoll]

That seems...very over the top to me. They shut down Bowdoin (twice), St. John Fisher, and Salisbury playing zone. Not sure sticking with it is ignorant by any stretch of the imagination. Also, D'Annolfo is [checks NCAA stats website] 82-13 as a head coach in the best conference in the country, and IIRC 6 of those losses came in his first season. What makes him overrated?

He inherited a roster that played in 3 straight national championships. I think this what 7 or 8 years since Tufts has made it to championship weekend.

[sleeperagent]

Coach D’Annolfo is a horrible coach. I can confirm this after playing for him for 4 years

[tech37]

Coach D’Annolfo is a horrible coach. I can confirm this after playing for him for 4 years

Ouch!

[Oaklax]

York making a comeback. Down 9-7 vs Union. Also the CNU broadcast is very nice to listen to.

[nelaxman]

It is surprising how far away Tufts is from RIT in regards to talent. Just Men vs Boys and not even close! Not good for Tufts as they were just manhandled and gave up program record for goals against in a game. After RIT roasted Tufts zone they had zero chance in their man to man defense. Tufts is losing some great seniors on offense and I just don’t see them making a run anytime soon with this defense or goalie.

[nelaxman]

Great timeout call by Tufts coach with 6:26 left down 26-11. Lol

[lilax]

Don’t think he’s a bad coach. But they’re not built to beat RIT.

They’re extremely disorganized and panic on defense when game plans don’t work. They were running around today like chickens with their heads cut off.

And they clearly didn’t learn anything from last years game, which was slide to everything and leave everything inside of 5 yards open.

Daly’s late teams always had disciplined defenses so when things broke down, they didn’t flinch. That’s what made them almost unbeatable.

[ah23]

He inherited a roster that played in 3 straight national championships.

Eh. Not really. From looking at their stats page, almost every starter/major contributor on the 2016 team graduated. They brought back two people with double digit points and one close defenseman.

To make my point a different way...here's a side-by-side comparison of the first five seasons of Jake Coon and Casey D'Annolfo at their respective schools:



I combined the 20/21 seasons for Tufts because of the pandemic; obviously it's still fewer games than a normal season but it at least looks more like a normal year. They are remarkably similar.

If you extend out further: in Coon's first ten seasons, RIT lost at home in the playoffs to NESCAC teams seven different times. Four of those losses ended undefeated seasons. I didn't hear anyone calling Coon the most overrated coach in the country when his teams were repeatedly flaming out in the playoffs at home against lower seeds - nor should I have. RIT won their first title in Coon's 11th full season (excluding the pandemic year). They might go back to back. This stuff takes time.

Winning at this level is hard. There are plenty of great teams in DIII. Only one team gets to win a championship every year. Calling people "overrated" who win at the level these guys do just doesn't pass the smell test to me. I MUCH prefer DIII lacrosse having varied champions rather than the same team making it every single year, and I just don't think it makes sense to call guys overrated for not winning titles all the time.

[Oaklax]

Should be a solid Championship game on Sunday. UNION vs RIT. RIT won by 1 during the regular season.

[BallHunt]

If Union and RIT are both in the natty then it would appear that the Liberty league is the best conference in the country.

RIT > Everyone else

I'm sure there is a set of stats for this.

[laxpert]

Thought Tufts would win, but man…that was a complete blowout. Made SJF look like a very average team for sixty minutes.

Yes in past years RIT has had a lot of success against zone D. It’s typically a team that has a lot of skill and finishing ability - not typically a team many coaches think they should zone.

Zone a Canadian team at your own risk. I believe RIT has 25 players from up north

Good Points...Today Tufts looked very average for fifty six minutes finally getting four tallies in the last four minutes. Note to self Don't Zone the box guys.

[Unknown Participant]

Thought Tufts would win, but man…that was a complete blowout. Made SJF look like a very average team for sixty minutes.

Yes in past years RIT has had a lot of success against zone D. It’s typically a team that has a lot of skill and finishing ability - not typically a team many coaches think they should zone.

Zone a Canadian team at your own risk. I believe RIT has 25 players from up north

Good Points...Today Tufts looked very average for fifty six minutes finally getting four tallies in the last four minutes. Note to self Don't Zone the box guys.

Tufts went on a 5-0 run in Q2 to make it a 10-6 game. Not that average. Before and after, yeah. In any event, change the gk ffs. The kid did not have it. There are 2 other gks dressed, plus 2 more. Just heck put one of them in.

MTA: "heck" is short for "fcuking"

[Honorable Mention]

Thought Tufts would win, but man…that was a complete blowout. Made SJF look like a very average team for sixty minutes.

Yes in past years RIT has had a lot of success against zone D. It’s typically a team that has a lot of skill and finishing ability - not typically a team many coaches think they should zone.

Zone a Canadian team at your own risk. I believe RIT has 25 players from up north

Good Points...Today Tufts looked very average for fifty six minutes finally getting four tallies in the last four minutes. Note to self Don't Zone the box guys.

Tufts went on a 5-0 run in Q2 to make it a 10-6 game. Not that average. Before and after, yeah. In any event, change the gk ffs. The kid did not have it. There are 2 other gks dressed, plus 2 more. Just heck put one of them in.

MTA: "heck" is short for "fcuking"

Quickly followed by a 6-0 RIT run and then a 5-0 RIT run to start the 4th quarter and make it a 26-11 game. Impressive weekend for the Tigers dismantling the NESCAC #1 & #2

[lilax]

Thought Tufts would win, but man…that was a complete blowout. Made SJF look like a very average team for sixty minutes.

Yes in past years RIT has had a lot of success against zone D. It’s typically a team that has a lot of skill and finishing ability - not typically a team many coaches think they should zone.

Zone a Canadian team at your own risk. I believe RIT has 25 players from up north

Good Points...Today Tufts looked very average for fifty six minutes finally getting four tallies in the last four minutes. Note to self Don't Zone the box guys.

Tufts went on a 5-0 run in Q2 to make it a 10-6 game. Not that average. Before and after, yeah. In any event, change the gk ffs. The kid did not have it. There are 2 other gks dressed, plus 2 more. Just heck put one of them in.

MTA: "heck" is short for "fcuking"

You could have put all 3 goalies in the cage and given Tufts weeks to prepare, it wasn’t going to make a difference. Tufts defense stunk and their adjustments stunk even more.

The zone was bad, but giving the Canadians their strong hands to the middle of the field and slide early to them might be the dumbest thing I have ever seen. It was 2 passes and an open look on the crease.

And it’s the 2nd year in a row where they’ve done it. They let the RIT middies do whatever they wanted last year.

26 goals, 21 assists. RIT’s starting attack combined for 19 goals.

Again, I don’t think D’Analfo is a bad coach, but have some common sense. At least try to make RIT dodge to their weak hands.

[LaxCrusader1]

That seems...very over the top to me. They shut down Bowdoin (twice), St. John Fisher, and Salisbury playing zone. Not sure sticking with it is ignorant by any stretch of the imagination. Also, D'Annolfo is [checks NCAA stats website] 82-13 as a head coach in the best conference in the country, and IIRC 6 of those losses came in his first season. What makes him overrated?

Here's my controversial question... is the Liberty about to supplant the NESCAC as the best conference in DIII?

Not saying that the NESCAC isn't a top 2 conference, but the growth of the game is catching up to them. Two liberty league teams in the championship game this year, with 5 teams consistently in the mix for NCAA tournament bids/runs (RIT, Union, SLU, Ithaca, RPI --> RIT's only loss).

Centennial was underrated this year as well. F&M, Ursinus, and Muhlenburg would all have been better tournament games than 'Noke. People underestimated Gburg against Union. They were more competitive than York, and people thought the Bullets were gonna get blown out.

Tear me a new one, NESCAC fans...

[ergit]

The starving children in Africa weep for your Division 3 lacrosse announcing miseries.

York by 2, Tufts by 8.

.

[HomerCoach]

That seems...very over the top to me. They shut down Bowdoin (twice), St. John Fisher, and Salisbury playing zone. Not sure sticking with it is ignorant by any stretch of the imagination. Also, D'Annolfo is [checks NCAA stats website] 82-13 as a head coach in the best conference in the country, and IIRC 6 of those losses came in his first season. What makes him overrated?

Here's my controversial question... is the Liberty about to supplant the NESCAC as the best conference in DIII?

Not saying that the NESCAC isn't a top 2 conference, but the growth of the game is catching up to them. Two liberty league teams in the championship game this year, with 5 teams consistently in the mix for NCAA tournament bids/runs (RIT, Union, SLU, Ithaca, RPI --> RIT's only loss).

Centennial was underrated this year as well. F&M, Ursinus, and Muhlenburg would all have been better tournament games than 'Noke. People underestimated Gburg against Union. They were more competitive than York, and people thought the Bullets were gonna get blown out.

Tear me a new one, NESCAC fans...

Good question...what do the numbers say the Power Rankings are for conferences this year? NESCAC, Liberty, Centennial, ODAC?

I agree...all 5 Centennial teams were better than the THREE ODAC tournament teams.

[BallHunt]

That seems...very over the top to me. They shut down Bowdoin (twice), St. John Fisher, and Salisbury playing zone. Not sure sticking with it is ignorant by any stretch of the imagination. Also, D'Annolfo is [checks NCAA stats website] 82-13 as a head coach in the best conference in the country, and IIRC 6 of those losses came in his first season. What makes him overrated?

Here's my controversial question... is the Liberty about to supplant the NESCAC as the best conference in DIII?

Not saying that the NESCAC isn't a top 2 conference, but the growth of the game is catching up to them. Two liberty league teams in the championship game this year, with 5 teams consistently in the mix for NCAA tournament bids/runs (RIT, Union, SLU, Ithaca, RPI --> RIT's only loss).

Centennial was underrated this year as well. F&M, Ursinus, and Muhlenburg would all have been better tournament games than 'Noke. People underestimated Gburg against Union. They were more competitive than York, and people thought the Bullets were gonna get blown out.

Tear me a new one, NESCAC fans...

Good question...what do the numbers say the Power Rankings are for conferences this year? NESCAC, Liberty, Centennial, ODAC?

I agree...all 5 Centennial teams were better than the THREE ODAC tournament teams.

I have not done a thorough roster analysis, but I think many top 10 teams will graduate many seniors, 5th year and grad students, including Tufts, CNU, and MIT. The COVID bubble of older players will matriculate but which teams and conferences will be the most affected?

[Pegasus5]

The controversial which is the best conference question is really not as controversial anymore. Other than the typical swag and bragging, no one really cared about that much until it came time to select the at large bids and one conference always seemed to get their on the bubble teams in because of "quality" losses. Seems now that they added more at large bids the issue gets played out on the field rather than speculating "who got screwed" and justifying why they didn't get the at large bid.

[nelaxman]

Liberty takes the cake as top conference this year. No questions asked!