St. John's University Athletics
St. John's Lacrosse Releases 2009 Schedule
9/24/2008 12:00:00 AM | Men's Lacrosse
Sept. 24, 2008
QUEENS, N.Y. - St. John's third-year head men's lacrosse coach Jason Miller announced the schedule for the 2009 season on Wednesday, which is highlighted by seven home games, non-conference match ups against Notre Dame and Duke, and seven conference games in the Red Storm's final season with the ECAC Lacrosse League.
"We're pleased with this spring's schedule as we continue to challenge ourselves by playing many of the best programs in the country," said Miller. "We have a lot of respect for the teams in the ECAC and are looking forward to mixing it up with them one more time. We are also excited about adding Notre Dame and starting what we hope to be a long standing BIG EAST rivalry with them. We're also thrilled to bring Duke here to Queens, so there is plenty to get excited about in 2009."
The 2009 season will be the last time the Red Storm lacrosse team will compete in the ECAC Lacrosse League, of which it has been a member for the past four seasons. In 2010, St. John's will participate in the newly formed BIG EAST Conference with fellow ECAC-foes Georgetown and Rutgers as well as Notre Dame, Providence, Syracuse and Villanova.
St. John's will host seven of its 14 games this spring, the most home contests since 1995. The home schedule includes three competitive conference opponents in Georgetown, Rutgers and Hobart as well as strong non-league opponents in Drexel, who ended the season No. 18 in the Nike/Inside Lacrosse Media Poll and No. 15 in the USILA Coaches Poll, and Duke, a 2008 National Semifinalist.
The Red Storm will once again face five squads that ranked in the top 25 a year ago, giving the team a solid strength of schedule, in and out of conference.
The team opens its exhibition play with two short fall contests at the 11th-annual Price Modern Lacrosse for Leukemia tournament in Brooklandville, Md., on Oct. 11. There, the Red Storm will play back-to-back games against Delaware and Towson, starting at 12:50 p.m.
In the spring, St. John's tunes up with three home exhibition games, going up against NYIT and C.W. Post in a noon double-header for the third-consecutive season on Jan. 31. The Red Storm will host the Lafayette Leopards on Feb. 7 for its last exhibition game before the team gears up for the strong schedule ahead.
Regular season play begins on the road for the Red Storm when the team travels to Worcester, Mass., on Feb. 14 to face the Holy Cross Crusaders, in its first of two games against Patriot League teams. The Feb. 14 start is the earliest in St. John's history. In 2008, the season opened at home on Feb. 16. The Red Storm returns home the following weekend in its first of three-straight home contests. On Feb. 21, St. John's hosts the Quinnipiac Bobcats of the Great Western Lacrosse League. The match-up is the third-ever between the opponents.
St. John's closes out the month with Georgetown University for its first league game on Feb. 28, and opens March against Drexel on March 7. Georgetown finished 2008 ranked No. 11 in the USILA Coaches Poll and No. 12 in the Nike/Inside Lacrosse Media Poll. Drexel was ranked No. 1 in the Colonial Conference in 2008, but for the second-consecutive season just missed an automatic berth to the NCAA Tournament.
In week five, the Red Storm has a two-game road swing against ECAC-foe Loyola and Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference-contender Siena. On March 14, St. John's will face the Loyola Greyhounds, in Baltimore, Md., in its second conference match up of 2009. The Greyhounds ended the season ranked No. 16/17 and lost 12-7 to Duke in the first round of the 2008 NCAA Tournament. The Red Storm will have a short rest before traveling upstate to Loudonville, N.Y., to play the Siena Saints on March 17, the first of two mid-week games for St. John's.
March ends at home for the Red Storm as the team hosts its second Patriot League opponent, Lehigh, on March 21 and Rutgers on March 28 for a conference match-up.
In April St. John's begins the heart of its league play as the team faces back-to-back conference road games against Massachusetts and Penn State on April 4 and April 11. Last season, the Red Storm defeated Penn State 11-7 at home in its first-ever televised contest. In week nine, the Red Storm continues ECAC-play as it hosts the Hobart Statesmen on April 18.
In another quick turn-around, St. John's will travel to Notre Dame, Ind., for a Monday afternoon contest against the Notre Dame Fighting Irish on April 20, in the first-ever meeting between the two teams. Notre Dame ended the season ranked No. 5 in the USILA Coaches poll and No. 6 in the Nike/Inside Lacrosse media poll. The Fighting Irish lost 11-9 in the quarterfinals of the 2008 NCAA Tournament to the eventual National Champions, Syracuse.
The Red Storm will play its final conference and road game against the Fairfield University Stags on April 25. St. John's defeated Fairfield 10-7 in its final home contest in 2008.
The season comes to a close on the Red Storm's home turf against the Duke University Blue Devils on May 3. In 2008, Duke finished first in the ACC and was nudged out of making it to the NCAA Tournament Finals in a 10-9 grudge match against Johns Hopkins, in a rematch of the 2007 National Championship title game. The meeting is the seventh between the Blue Devils and Red Storm, with the last meeting between the teams being in Durham, N.C., last May in St. John's 2008 season-closer. The last time the Red Storm played Duke at home, St. John's won, 9-8, in overtime on March 14, 1989.
In 2008, St. John's finished 2-11 and 2-5 in the ECAC. Both wins came at home.
Get Men's Lacrosse News:
If you would like to get the latest men's lacrosse news delivered straight to your own e-mail address, send an e-mail to Kristin Duffy at stjcommunications@stjohns.edu with "Lacrosse E-mail" as the subject.
For the most up-to-date information and statistics on St. John's Lacrosse please visit www.RedStormSports.com or call our hotline at 1-888-GO-STORM.