After an
outstanding performance in Saturday’s American Lacrosse Conference Championship
game, the University of Florida lacrosse team earned the No. 1 overall seed for
the 2012 NCAA Tournament. Florida will take on the America East champion Albany
(12-5, 3-3 AE) at Donald R. Dizney Stadium on Saturday, May 12, at 1 p.m.
“It’s a proud
moment for all of us,” said Head Coach Amanda O’Leary. “I think these young women worked really, really
hard for this, and just to see their name at the No. 1 seed says a lot about
our program and certainly where we’re headed.”
The Gators
earn their second-straight trip the NCAA Tournament, receiving the No. 4 seed
in 2011. Florida hosted Stanford on May 14, 2011, in the first-ever NCAA
Lacrosse Tournament game ever played in the state of Florida, where UF defeated
the Cardinal 13-11 in the first round. The Gators then hosted Duke the
following weekend, but came up short, falling 13-9 to the Blue Devils.
Florida and
Albany will meet for the first time on Saturday.
“We’re absolutely
thrilled,” said junior attacker Caroline Chesterman (South Nyack, N.Y.). “We couldn’t ask for a better
position than number one. We’re going to face a really good team in Albany, and
we’re just really excited.”
Florida is
4-0 all-time against members of the America East conference, including wins
over UMBC and Stony Brook earlier this season. The Great Danes are 2-2 against
current members of the ALC, defeating Penn State in the 2011 regular season,
splitting a pair of contests with Vanderbilt and falling, 18-4, to Northwestern
in the 2011 NCAA Tournament Quarterfinals.
Should the
Gators advance, they will host the winner of the first-round matchup between #8
Towson and Penn State next weekend. Florida is 3-0 against fellow-ALC member
Penn State, including a 20-11 victory last month. UF has never faced Towson and
has played just one contest against a CAA opponent, defeating William &
Mary, 21-8, on Mar. 17.
Florida will
be looking for its first-ever Final Four appearance, hoping to participate in the
final two rounds hosted by Stony Brook University in Stony Brook, N.Y. Should
the Gators claim a national title, they would be the fastest program in history
to do so, passing Northwestern’s 2005 title which came in the Wildcats’ fourth
season as a reinstated Division I program.
Northwestern
captured the second seed and will face at-large bid Notre Dame on Saturday at 4
p.m. The winner of that game will take on the victor ACC at-large teams #7 Duke
and Virginia. ACC Champion Maryland claimed the third seed, and will face
Atlantic 10 Champion Massachusetts on Saturday at 2 p.m, with the winner taking
on either #6 Loyola, the BIG EAST Champion, or at-large bid Penn.
Syracuse
earned the fourth seed and will host Ivy League Champion Dartmouth on Sunday,
with the winner facing the advancing team out of #5 North Carolina and Navy.
Florida is
4-2 this season against NCAA Tournament teams, having faced North Carolina (L,
9-11), Syracuse (L, 11-12 OT), Penn State (W, 13-11), Dartmouth (W, 20-4) and
Northwestern (W, 8-7; W, 14-7). The Gators are 7-7 all-time against the 2012
tournament field, having seen six of the 15 opposing teams in this year’s
tournament.
Albany Head
Coach John Battaglino took the reigns of the program at the start of the 2011
season, leading the Great Danes to a perfect, 15-0, regular-season record,
their first-ever America East Tournament Championship and their first bid to
the NCAA Tournament. Albany won the first 18 games of the year before falling
to eventual National Champion Northwestern, 18-4, in the NCAA Quarterfinals.
The Great
Danes opened the season ranked No. 16 in the nation in the Inside
Lacrosse/deBeer media poll and rose as high as 13th on Mar. 19 after defeating
Boston College, 16-12, but a pair of losses to Massachusetts and UMBC dropped
Albany out of the rankings. The Great Danes went just 3-3 in regular-season
conference play, but earned the fourth seed for the America East Tournament,
where they knocked off top-seeded Boston University and second-seeded Stony
Brook to win their second-straight conference championship.
