The Golden Eagles pick up the sticks for the first time in a week and a half on a road trip to the Rocky Mountains.
Oh, man, remember lacrosse?
By the time we get to first draw on Saturday in the mountains, Marquette will have had 10 days off in between games. That’s a lot of rest after staying in the fight on the road against #12 Harvard and then topping Bellarmine three days later at home. Maybe the win over the Knights wasn’t quite on the level of making the Crimson play to the whistle to beat the Golden Eagles, but y’know, short rest and so on.
The question now is whether that Harvard contest was a true turning point for this season. Have the Golden Eagles figured something out about how they’re doing things here in Jake Richard’s first season as head coach. The Golden Eagles have looked just fine against unranked foes this season, but went 1-2 against ranked teams in terms of “do we look competitive out there?” On Saturday, Marquette gets an interesting mix of the two things: An opponent that’s 1-5 and not ranked right now…… but did come away with a win over a ranked foe to start the year after earning a few preseason top 20 votes.
Maybe Utah’s better than their record. Maybe Utah’s worse than their preseason optimism where they were picked to win the ASUN. If Marquette is getting better, then it’s time to go beat someone and make a statement.
Game #7: at Utah Utes (1-5)
Date: Saturday, March 15, 2025
Time: 1pm Central
Location: Ute Field, Salt Lake City, Utah
Streaming: ESPN+
Live Stats: Stat Broadcast
Twitter Updates: @MarquetteMLax
Bluesky Updates: @AnonymousEagle
Marquette is 0-3 all time against Utah. Two of the three games have been one goal games, both of which happened in Milwaukee in the first and third meetings, the latter of which was last March. Marquette’s only visit to Salt Lake City came two years ago and that game was a two-goal margin, 18-16.
2025 started off pretty great for Utah. They were earning votes in the Inside Lacrosse preseason top 20 poll, they were a unanimous pick to win the ASUN, Ryan Stines was a unanimous selection as the ASUN Preseason Offensive Player of the Year, and Cody Hart was the ASUN Preseason Midfielder of the Year. Then they went out to Columbus and beat then-#19 Ohio State pretty handily, 19-13. They were up 7-2 on the Buckeyes just 90 seconds into the second quarter and outscored their opponents 6-3 in the final frame to lock up a win.
That W is still Utah’s only win of the season.
Some of that is not their fault. Losing a one goal game to a Delaware team that’s receiving poll votes? Eh, that’s life. Losing 10-8 on the road against then-#14 Denver? Eh, that’s how it goes sometimes. Falling 11-10 on the road against Vermont after giving up a 9-8 lead in the fourth and having four minutes to tie the game? Not great, and Vermont hasn’t won since. Getting clonked 15-5 at home by then-#11 Syracuse isn’t anyone’s idea of a fun afternoon, but the real problem there is because the Orange went up 11-1 at halftime.
And then, finally, last weekend, Utah was up 9-8 on Dartmouth with four minutes to go. Hey, remember that Vermont game? Yeah, so, a pair of man-up goals 31 seconds apart for the Big Green flipped that margin around, and Dartmouth tacked on an insurance goal with 1:50 to play.
Ryan Stines had a big day in that win over Ohio State to make that ASUN preseason honor look shiny, but he’s not quite getting it done since then. Two goals and three assists against OSU, followed by two goals and five assists against Delaware is great…. but that means Stines has just three goals and seven assists in Utah’s last four games. 10 points in four games is great…. but when you’re still leading the team in shots while tied for third in goals…. well, that’s not what you want. The assists are propelling him to a team high 22 points on the year, so that’s good as well as something that MU is going to have to worry about.
Luke McNamara is Utah’s top goal scorer with 14, so he’s netting goals at a better than two-per-game clip right now. Cade Faulkner is right at two per game with 12 goals this season, and they’re the only two double digit goal scorers on the roster as well as the only guys other than Stines with double digits in points.
Colin Lenskold has started every game in net and played everything except for the closing minutes of the blowout against Syracuse. He’s not doing too bad when it comes to swatting away goals with a save percentage of .474, but all told, the Utes are letting in 12.08 goals per 60 minutes with Lenskold in the net. There’s also that “giving up late goals in tight games” problem that we mentioned earlier, but honestly? I’d rather that Marquette not test that theory.