Stony Brook Women’s Lacrosse, the No. 1 seed in the country for the last 10 weeks, was named the No. 5 seed on Sunday, May 6 in the NCAA Women’s Lacrosse Tournament.
Stony Brook, which received all 23 number one votes this past weekend and most recently won the America East Championship for a sixth straight season, is seeded below Maryland, North Carolina, James Madison and Boston College, which were awarded the No. 1, No. 2, No. 3 and No. 4 seeds, respectively.
Stony Brook has had its fair share of underseeding in the past, specifically last season. The Seawolves were going to be ranked seventh in last year’s poll, but were relegated to a No. 8 seed. The team went on to face Maryland in the quarterfinals and lost in the final minutes.
The team celebrated multiple achievements this season both collectively and individually. They were the only team in both Division I men’s and women’s lacrosse to go undefeated this season. They have won 32 straight games at Kenneth P. LaValle Stadium, and the team’s 19-game overall winning streak is the longest in Stony Brook women’s lacrosse program history. Redshirt-senior attacker Courtney Murphy became the NCAA career leader in goals back on April 5 against Hartford and senior attacker Kylie Ohlmiller broke the NCAA career record for points and assists on April 22 against UMBC.
The Seawolves will have a first-round bye for being the No. 5 seed by the selection committee. Their first game of the tournament will be in the second round against the winner of the first round matchup between Penn State and Penn University. If the team is victorious in the second round and if all top seeds win their games, they will have to travel to Boston College to face the Eagles in the quarterfinals.
Head coach Joe Spallina hopes that his team will not be overlooked heading into Sunday’s second round contest, which will be played at Kenneth P. LaValle Stadium on May 13 at 12 p.m. Spallina gave his take on the selection process following Sunday’s America East Championship victory.
“I mean, we have the number one non-conference [Rating Percentage Index] in the country,” Spallina said. “That’s got to be worth something. If we aren’t number one, what they’re basically saying is if you’re not in the Big 10, if you’re not in the ACC, you can’t be a one or two, maybe even a three or a four. So they’re going to have to look at themselves in the mirror and figure it out. I would just hope that just because we aren’t a power five conference, that we get the respect that we deserve.”
