Maryland a frequent pick in Inside Lacrosse's 2026 Final Four, All-American picks

John Gugs
21 hours ago
2 min read

With the 2026 lacrosse season finally here, the Inside Lacrosse staff has released their predictions for the year including their preseason All-Americans, their award winners, and their final four and champion predictions. With the Terps coming in at #1 on the Kane Footwear media poll, they were well represented in all of the predictions.

With the Inside Lacrosse award winner predictions, two Terps were named for awards in Will Schaller and Eric Spanos. Schaller was given the defensive player of the year award three times while Spanos was given the Tewaaraton once. Terry Foy, Matt Kinnear, and Kevin Brown gave Schaller the award after he exploded on the scene last season earning himself the Big Ten defensive player of the year award. Schaller led the way with being picked three times while Bobby Van Buren of Ohio State and Shawn Lyght of Notre Dame were both picked twice. Dan Aburn gave Spanos the nod for the Tewaaraton award, making him one of four players to be predicted to win the award. Spanos came on strong to end the season earning himself the famous #1 jersey for the Terps this season.

In the Inside Lacrosse final four and champion predictions, the Terps were tied for being the most selected team to make Memorial Day weekend in Charlottesville. Both the Terps and Princeton were selected to make the final four six out of seven times. However, the Terps came in second when it came to who was selected to win the national championship. The only team ahead of the Terps was Syracuse who was picked three times. Foy and Aburn were the two Inside Lacrosse staffers to pick the Terps.

On the Nike preseason media All-American teams, the Terps were tied with Princeton and Syracuse with seven total representatives this season. Schaller, Spanos, Eric Kolar, AJ Larkin, Braden Erksa, Henry Dodge, and Leo Johnson were all given preseason All-American honors to start the 2026 season by Inside Lacrosse. Schaller was one of three first team unanimous selections along with Shawn Lyght and Aidan Maguire. Kolar joined Schaller on the first team as a short-stick defensive midfielder. Spanos earned second team honors as an attackman along with Larkin as a long stick midfielder. Erksa and Johnson were honorable mentions as attackmen while Dodge also earned an honorable mention as a face-off man.

After the season opener at Richmond was postponed to a date yet to be announced, the Terps are now gearing up to open their 2026 campaign at home against in-state rivals Loyola at home. The game is currently set to face-off at noon ET on February 7th in SECU Stadium, and will be airing on BTN+.

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