My comments clearly got some of you riled up. I'm not negative in my view of the team. In fact, I'm much more positive now than I was at the beginning of the season and I think the program can be a competitive top 10 team next year. My point is simple - to go from the outhouse to the penthouse in one season would be a great story but doesn't often happen. To do it in the toughest conference in lacrosse would be miraculous. All we have to do is remember the 2020 and 2021 teams. Those teams were good but when matched up with other ACC teams that loaded up on covid transfers, defensive weaknesses (coaching and talent) were exposed and we appeared to be outcoached.
The biggest positives for the team are the big time talent infusion of the freshmen, Mark, Kirst etc. As good as all that is, it simply raises our offensive talent level to be similar to and not better than Duke, ND and UNC (but still not as good as UVA). On D, we cannot match the current talent/experience of the ACC but that may change as some of the other ACC teams lose their seniors etc. Mark appears to be the real deal - this last stretch will be his biggest test. That means we have a goalie that can match up with Entenmann and Krieg and probably better than Nunes and Helm for sure. As for fogo, let's not go there!
The last area of the team which on paper does not match up with the ACC is coaching. Let me think - Tiffany is a proven elite coach, Joe Breschi an experienced winner, Danowski getting old but still effective and Corrigan is one of the best. Gait has yet to show what he can do as a men's coach regardless of his incredible player career.
If we continue to improve on D, get a good fogo and Gait ups his game as a coach, then we may well have something special.