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Virginia men’s lacrosse team looks to get back to final weekend in May

Scott Ratcliffe
virginia lacrosse
Photo: UVA Athletics

After hoisting a national championship trophy in two of the three previous seasons, the Virginia men’s lacrosse team saw its 2022 campaign come to an end in last May’s NCAA quarterfinals at the hands of eventual national champion Maryland.

“There’s a reason [the season] ended,” UVA coach Lars Tiffany said after the loss, “and it’s because we’ve just faced — in my opinion — the best team in the last 16 years.”

The Cavaliers finished 12-4 on the season (5-1 in the ACC), but came up short of their ultimate goal, while also losing the program’s all-time points scorer, attacker Matt Moore, who was taken fourth overall in the Premier Lacrosse League Draft. Moore ended his memorable Wahoo career with 277 points (143 goals, second in program history; 134 assists, fifth).

However, UVA was chosen as the No. 1 team in the USA Lacrosse/Nike preseason poll earlier this month, as Tiffany has reloaded the roster with some of the best young talent in the country, along with some experienced transfers.

Along with Moore, Tiffany will need to replace midfielders Regan Quinn, Jack Peele and Jack Simmons, as well as attacker Paul Rodriguez and goalkeeper Miles Thompson, but the Hoos are bringing in a loaded recruiting class to help fill some of the void. More on that later — first we’ll take a look at who is returning.

It all starts on the attack with redshirt junior Connor Shellenberger, a 2022 Tewaaraton Award finalist who was named to USA Lacrosse’s Preseason All-American first team and led the Cavaliers with 76 points (32 goals, team-high 44 assists).

Joining Shellenberger in USA Lacrosse’s preseason honors were eight other highly experienced Cavaliers — junior defenseman Cole Kastner was named to the second team, while graduate midfielder Jeff Conner, senior attacker Payton Cormier, graduate faceoff specialist Petey LaSalla, grad-transfer midfielder Thomas McConvey, graduate short-stick defensive midfielder Grayson Sallade, redshirt senior defenseman Cade Saustad and sophomore attacker Griffin Schutz were all honorable-mention selections.

Cormier scored a team-high 50 goals last season, while LaSalla racked up 215 faceoff wins and scooped up a team-high 113 ground balls. Sophomore goalkeeper Matt Nunes is back between the pipes, and he set a Cavalier freshman record with his 159 saves a year ago.

As for the incoming freshman class, ranked the best in the country by Inside Lacrosse, it’s headlined by two of the top five overall recruits, midfielder Joey Terenzi (No. 3) and attacker Truitt Sunderland (No. 4).

The class also features three other top-50 recruits — midfielder Mac Eldridge and defensemen John Schroter and Malachi Jones — as well as Charlottesville native Tim Myers, the son of UVA women’s lacrosse coach Julie Myers.

“My entire life I always dreamed about playing lacrosse at Virginia,” said Myers. “Growing up with a mother who coaches at Virginia always made me really want to play there too. I played on a local team coached by Virginia players and coaches until my sophomore year. Even when I left for another team, I knew UVA was where I always wanted to be.”

In addition, the Cavaliers made use of the transfer portal, bringing in former Stanford linebacker Ricky Miezan, who will return to lacrosse after four years on the gridiron in the Pac-12.

Miezan, an Alexandria native who attended Episcopal HS, was the top recruit in the nation coming out of high school, but decided to play football with the Cardinal instead, where he registered 129 total tackles in two seasons as a starter after injuries cut short his freshman and sophomore years.

“After a standout football career as a Stanford linebacker, Ricky could not be more excited to pick up a stick again and be back playing lacrosse,” Tiffany said. “What we are gaining here is a caring man with a big heart; a man who also happens to bring to the field a howitzer of a shot and blazing speed.”

McConvey, a 6-foot-4 grad transfer midfielder from Vermont, will also be joining the team for his final year of eligibility. In his senior season with the Catamounts, McConvey set a program record with 60 goals to go with his 14 assists, earning him third-team All-American honors from Inside Lacrosse.

Griffin Kology, a 6-2 sophomore, transferred from Richmond and is expected to be a solid contributor on the defensive end. He’s the younger brother of former Cavalier Kyle Kology (an All-American defenseman who won two national championships) and the cousin of former UVA basketball star John Crotty, who still holds the school record for assists.

“Griffin’s arrival to Charlottesville has been one of great anticipation for our staff and team,” said Tiffany. “After being an integral part of the Richmond defense that stymied us in its victory over our team last season, we were eager to have him on our side moving forward.”

Looking at the schedule, Virginia will get a pair of exhibition warm ups prior to the season opener against Michigan on Feb. 11, in what will be the first-ever meeting between the two schools. This Saturday, the Hoos take on Navy at 1 p.m. in Springfield, and then will travel to Georgetown next Saturday (Feb. 4) at 1.

Along with an always-challenging ACC schedule, the Cavaliers will face four of the 2022 NCAA Tournament teams — Harvard, Ohio State, Richmond and Maryland — in non-conference play. UVA will host eight of its 14 regular-season contests this season at Klöckner Stadium, where the Cavaliers are sporting an eight-game winning streak dating all the way back to 2021.

The Ohio State game will be played in Naples, Fla., on Feb. 25, marking Virginia’s first game played in the Sunshine State. On March 7, the Hoos travel to Baltimore to go up against Johns Hopkins in the annual meeting with the Blue Jays.

In conference competition, Virginia faces both Duke and Notre Dame twice (home and away), while hosting Syracuse and traveling to North Carolina. This year’s NCAA Tournament begins on May 13, with the national semifinals and championship to be decided in Philadelphia at the end of the month, which happens to be the site of the Hoos’ 2019 title.

Scott Ratcliffe

Scott Ratcliffe

Scott Ratcliffe has worked as a freelance writer for several publications over the past decade-plus, with a concentration on local and college sports. He is also a writer and editor for his father’s website, JerryRatcliffe.com, dedicated to the coverage of University of Virginia athletics.