Maryland men's lacrosse look to start Big Ten play off with a bang

John Gugs
Mar 20
5 min read

#11 Maryland (3-3) at #9 Penn State (4-3)

Where: University Park, PA, Panzer Stadium

When: Saturday March 21st, 3PM

TV: Big Ten Network

Betting: Maryland +1.5, O/U: 22 (DraftKings)

Coming off of a thrilling 13-12 triple overtime win over rivals Virginia, the Terps will look to get to above .500 again as they open up conference play against Penn State. With both teams starting off the season with three losses heading into Big Ten play, both teams will be looking to start off conference play with a bang.

Penn State is led by Jeff Tambroni who is in his 16th season with a record of 130-87 since taking over the Nittany Lions Program. Tambroni has a record of 2-13 against the Terps while at Penn State.The Nittany Lions are coming off of a close 10-8 loss to North Carolina at a neutral site game in Charlotte, North Carolina. With their other two losses being to Navy and Villanova, the Nittany Lions will be looking to beat the Terps at home to give them a big RPI boost and to start conference play on a high note.

On offense, the Nittany Lions are led by Hunter Aquino. Aquino has 17 points off of 12 goals and five assists in just five games for the Nittany Lions. However, Aquino has been out the last two games due to an injury and the Nittany Lions have relied on Kyle Lehman and Jack Iannantuono to fill his shoes and they have done fairly well. With Aquino out, Lehman and Iannantuono have scored a combined 14 points. One thing that Penn State does very well is share the ball. Of the 99 goals they have scored this season, 61 of them have come off of an assist. With 61.6% of their goals coming off of assists, the biggest reason the Nittany Lions move the ball so well has been their off ball movement. Penn State’s star players have done great beating their man off of dodges and drawing slides. Once defenses are drawing slides, their off ball players have been great at finding open spaces behind the slides to get open for easy goals. However, like the Terps offense, the Nittany Lions offense struggles with turnovers. Penn State turns the ball over 19 times a game, including 32 of their turnovers coming while trying to clear the ball. With the absence of Schaller, the Terps defense will need the Nittany Lions to turn the ball over to give the offense as many extra possessions as possible.

On defense, Penn State is led by Alex Ross. Ross leads the team with 15 caused turnovers on the year while adding 20 ground balls, a goal, and an assist to his name. Ross is an honorable mention All-American and is widely regarded as a top five defender in the Big Tenn. Along with Ross, Penn State relies on Patrick Keenan to get lots of stops as well. Keenan is second on the team in caused turnovers with nine and also has seven ground balls to his name. The Nittany Lion defense is very good at causing turnovers and making teams cough the ball up. In seven games, Penn State’s opponents have turned the ball over 125 times with 73 of those being caused turnovers by the Nittany Lions. However, the biggest weakness of the Nittany Lion defense is their goalie play. The Penn State goalies have a combined 45.4% save percentage with their everyday starter in Preston Hawkins saving 46.4% of the shots on goal he has faced. If the Terps are able to get tons of shots on goal, the offense could do just enough to pull off the road win on Saturday.

Three things to watch out for

How does the face-off battle play out?

Penn State and the Terps both have very good fogo duos on their squad. Reid Gills and Colby Baldwin have combined for winning 60.5% of their face-offs this season. While Henry Dodge and Jonah Carrier have won 64.1% of their face-offs this season. In a game with two struggling goaltenders and two teams possibly missing their best players on offense, every possession will matter. Whoever wins the face-off battle this Saturday could have a big advantage towards who pulls out the win.

How does the goalie battle play out?

Brian Ruppel started the season fairly shaky in net for the Terps. However, Ruppel has had a 50% save percentage or better then last three weeks including last week against Virginia where he had a 53.8% save percentage and earned himself Big Ten Specialist of the week honors. On the other hand, Hawkins for Penn State has had just two games above 50% where he had a 60% and a 61.1% save percentage against both of the Nittany Lion’s Ivy League opponents. If Ruppel is able to keep up his form and Hawkins keeps struggling in goal, I like the Terps chances this weekend to pull out the win.

How does Peter Laake handle the pressure as the main cover defender?

The loss of first team All-American Will Schaller is impossible to overstate. Not only is he the best defender on the field but he is a big leader for the defense off the field. It is not easy at all to replace a guy with 45 career caused turnovers in just 32 games started. However, this is something that Laake was brought in to do. Laake was a five star close defender in the 2024 recruiting class. Last season, Laake appeared in 16 games and caused two turnovers and picked up four ground balls. To start this season, as an everyday starter, Laake has six caused turnovers and 11 ground balls. Now that Laake is the new #1 cover defender, the pressure will be on him every week now to stop and contain the quarterbacks or initiators of every offense the Terps face the rest of the season. If Laake is able to step up to the plate, it will be massive for the Terps defense as they finish the season.

IBG prediction: This is a game between two teams that are both looking to add a quality win to their resume and give themselves momentum heading into the bulk of conference play. Both of these teams are looked at as teams that can win the conference and both will be looking to prove so on Saturday. I expect this to be another hard fought and close physical game between two desperate teams like the Terps had last week. Spanos and Aquino’s status for the game this week will be crucial for both squads. If Aquino is back for Penn State, it will open up the Penn State offense and give them three great scorers and initiators at attack. If Spanos is able to come back this week, like Aquino it will help open up the Terps offense, and bring a leader back onto the field. However, no matter the injury status of both teams, the 13-2 record Terps head coach John Tillman has against Penn State since coming to College Park can not be ignored. This feels like a game where the Terps might have the less talented squad, but the advantage in coaching that they have could very well give them the edge in this game. I believe the Terps will show up ready to play on Saturday and will come out to a 11-9 win over the Nittany Lions to start conference play and to get back to above .500.

The Terps have not won their conference opener since 2023, which was against Penn State. Starting Big Ten play will be a massive boost for the Terps momentum heading into the final weeks of the regular season and will be big towards Big Ten standings later in the year. The game is set to face-off at 3PM at Panzer Stadium and will be airing on the Big Ten Network.

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