March Begins, College Lacrosse Is As Deep As Ever

March has begun rolling along in the 2026 college lacrosse season and I have started to see a few things round into shape with where teams are going to sit moving into the middle part of the year.

I have 11 teams with a legit shot to win the national championship. I usually believe in four or five. The depth of the country this spring is crazy. I am not sure if it’s related too much to the transfer portal or the fact that different schools are starting to invest more in lacrosse. Either way from the fan’s perspective there cant be a better time to be a fan of college lacrosse, or get into college lacrosse.

Early March Top 20 Poll

1. Princeton

2. Notre Dame

3. Richmond

4. Harvard

5. UNC

6. Duke

7. Ohio State

8. Syracuse

9. Penn State

10. Maryland

11. Georgetown

12. Johns Hopkins

13. Penn

14. Cornell

15. Army

16. Denver

17. St. Josephs

18. Rutgers

19. Jacksonville

20. Utah

Navy was in the poll a couple of weeks ago. They took down Jacksonville on Tuesday night in an awesome game that came down to a pole goal from Sean Gallagher to win it. The Phins havent beat a top team yet (Navy has a win over Penn St) but have played their tough schedule tight. Utah is a team that can have anyone on upset alert.

The Inside Lacrosse poll has seen up to 6 teams receive first place votes so far this season. I have had a different #1 ranked team each week so far. I wouldn’t be surprised to see another team at the #1 spot when my next article comes out.

Richmond is sniffing around their first ever #1 ranking and after graduating a lot on the defensive end they look like even more of a contender in 2026. Wins over Cornell and Georgetown show me their spot in the top five isn’t a fluke. They have experience in the quarterfinals from last season. I wouldn’t want to play the Spiders in May.

Harvard is also in the midst of their best season of all time. The Crimson also graduated a lot of talent (Sam King) but are getting a lot of young guys to step up. Can’t wait to watch them go up against Princeton later this year. The Ivy begins league play this coming weekend. Penn has a big test with Harvard to prove to a lot of people they belong in conversations about the postseason.

Virginia in a rough spot but the ACC is as deep as ever. The Hoos got blown out at home against a mediocre Towson team over the weekend. Seems like Lars Tiffany is going to need to make some adjustments fast or else his time in Charlottesville is winding down.

Notre Dame continues to impress me week in and week out. They just took down Maryland and Ohio State in back to back weeks on the road. The Irish have a top tier defense and their offense is able to keep them in games without a Kavanagh on the roster.

UNC really impressed me in last weekend’s doubleheader at Penn and Princeton. After beating a tough Penn team on Friday night, they hung in a game with Princeton where the Tiger goalie had 25 saves. UNC dominated most of the game but ran into a hot goalie.

A lot of people are talking about how Maryland has a goalie problem and should move on from Brian Ruppell. I see it more as a down year for the Maryland offense, which looks broken at some points so far this season. Eric Spanos has not stepped up as the primary dodger or ball handler, and neither has anyone else. I think this weekend’s Maryland/Virginia game might put the nail in the coffin in my mind for the loser. A loss in this one is not ideal.

The Patriot League is deep. Obviously have already talked about Navy above. But Lafayette just won their biggest conference game in program history, taking down Army on Friday night led by their goalie who had an awesome night. Loyola has won four in a row and their young offense has some experience now. Boston U is on the edge of my rankings as well. They’ve won a couple of big games over Navy and Dartmouth. Patriot League play continues this weekend with a couple of big games on the card including Army/Boston U. I would expect Army to bounce back from their loss last Friday but Boston is another team with a dangerous offense and goalie who can win them games.

The increase this year in neutral site games has been cool to see, with Corrigan Sports leading the way. Houston, Atlanta, Charlotte have all gotten top tier games so far this year. Baltimore will see some neutral site games and so will Long Island. It has been years since the last early season premier neutral site event (think Face-Off Classic or Big City Classic) and I hope we see something like that pop up again. The event at Audi Field a few years ago was cool too. For now it is cool to see lacrosse growing enough in non-hot bed areas to have big name programs play there. #5 North Carolina and #9 Penn State play this weekend in Charlotte in a game that will be won in the trenches. Penn State has one of the best faceoff men in the nation so may dominate possession. Their sub-par goalie play is not ideal for a UNC offense that will put up 50+ shots.

For all of you Division 3 fans out there, the Callum Robinson Mustang Classic is this weekend at Stevenson University. In terms of neutral site games this is the best collection of them the sport has to offer. Friday and Saturday at Stevenson some of the top division 3 teams will be playing straight through from 11:30am to 10pm.

The teams that will be there this year include #1 Tufts, #2 Christopher Newport, #4 Lynchburg, #8 Gettysburg, #10 Dickinson, #12 RIT, #13 Washington and Lee, #15 St. Lawrence, Denison and host Stevenson. Keep an eye on Lynchburg this year, who has already taken down Salisbury and has a couple more top-10 games this weekend. #1 and #2 will meet Saturday afternoon at 3:30. The big stories being (1) can anyone take down Tufts, who hasn’t lost since April 2024 and (2) can CNU finally break through this year and make it to a championship game after being so close for close to 10 years.

Lots of great lacrosse around the Baltimore area coming up. Hopkins, Loyola and Maryland all play at home and the Mustang Classic is in Owings Mills. Enjoy the games (in all divisions) this weekend!