April 27, 2018
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UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. - The No. 14 Penn State Men's Lacrosse team hosts the University of Michigan for the final regular season Big Ten game at 11 a.m. at Panzer Stadium on Saturday morning.
The Nittany Lions will be celebrating the careers of its seven seniors, Tanner Peck, Tripp Traynor, Ryan Keenan, Chris Isenberg, Hunter Pearl, Tyler Butler, and Will Schreiner, roughly 30 minutes prior to the game.
Penn State has played the Wolverines six times since 2012, and the Nittany Lions hold a 6-0 record over Michigan.
PARKING
Fans are encouraged to park in Lower Lot 44. In the event this lot fills up, Stadium West or Porter North can be used as overflow parking. Updated tailgating guidelines can be found HERE
LAST TIME OUT
No. 12 Penn State men's lacrosse fell, 11-8, to No. 10 Rutgers in a Big Ten showdown in High Point Solutions Stadium on the RU campus on Sunday evening.
The Nittany Lions saw sophomores Mac O'Keefe and Dylan Foulds each record three points in the loss, O'Keefee netting three goals, while Foulds scored a goal and dished out two assists.
O'Keefe finished the game with a game-high six ground balls, and added a caused turnover, while Foulds added two ground balls.
Penn State also saw Kevin Hill find the back of the cage twice, while freshman Brian Townsend and senior Tanner Peck also added goals. Senior Ryan Keenan dished out two assists out of the midfield, while junior Matt Donnelly added one.
The Nittany Lions saw Michael Aronow cause a career-high three turnovers while adding five ground balls. On the backline, sophomore Colby Kneese recorded nine saves.
At the face-off 'x,' sophomore Gerard Arceri continued to battle through, going 8-13, while freshman Jake Glatzhad a breakout performance when called upon down the stretch, going a perfect 7-7, adding two ground balls.
ARCERI NAMED TEWAARATON NOMINEE
Sophomore Gerard Arceri has been named to the list of 25 nominees for the 2018 Tewaaraton Award. The Tewaaraton Award is recognized as the pre-eminent lacrosse award, annually honoring the top male and female college lacrosse player in the United States.
Arceri leads the Big Ten in both face-off winning percentage, .698, and ground balls per game, 10.77. Both of his marks are good for fourth in the nation.
The St. James, N.Y., native, has also recorded a career-best six goals this season and has dished out one assist.
SPILLANE EMBRACING NEW ROLE
After spending his first two years with the Nittany Lions in the midfield, Spillane has embraced his new role at attack this season in light of junior Grant Ament's injury. Although the position swap was a big change for Spillane at first, he's finding his stride.
"It's gotten a lot better, I've definitely gotten more comfortable throughout the year," Spillane said. "The way we play offense has definitely made it a little bit easier with that free-flowing style. It's great playing with guys that are so focused on each other and don't care about individual stats, but how the offense in general does."
Spillane had a stellar outing against Johns Hopkins, scoring two goals to go along with a personal-best five assists. Spillane also picked up honors from the United States Intercollegiate Lacrosse Association for his performance.
READ MORE: HERE
KEENAN DRAFTED
Penn State men's lacrosse senior Ryan Keenan was selected at the 54th overall pick by the reigning MLL champions Ohio Machine in Wednesday night's Major League Lacrosse draft.
"Being drafted is pretty awesome," Keenan said of being named in the draft. "It's an honor to represent Penn State Lacrosse at the next level and as the years go on you will see a lot more names on this team get drafted. Our team has so much talent and it's an honor to play with these guys every day and I could not have gotten drafted without any of them."
Keenan, a captain for the Nittany Lions, has scored 17 goals out of the midfield and has added eight assists, 20 ground balls, and two caused turnovers.
NITTANY LIONS SHIFTING FOCUS INWARD
Every Monday the coaching staff meets with the team to reflect on their individual performances from the weekend. During this week's session, the Nittany Lions were eager to add to the conversation and bring focus to the areas they feel they need to improve upon.
"There were several decent plays that were made throughout the course of the game, we just didn't connect enough of them," Penn State head coach Jeff Tambroni said. "It was tough. When we talked to our guys about things that needed to be worked on, plenty of hands went up, so it was nice to see our guys have a decent understanding about what needs to be done this week."
Although the team fell short executing plays successfully throughout the game, one positive to emerge was their consistent level of hard work. Throughout several momentum shifts, the Nittany Lions refused to give up or deviate from their style of blue-collar lacrosse.
Full Article: Here
QUAD CORE OF CAPTAINS
The 2018 Nittany Lion squad will be led by senior middies Ryan Keenan, Tanner Peck, and Tripp Traynor, and redshirt junior defender Mike Aronow. When asked about their leadership skills, Head Coach Jeff Tambroni mentioned how each was different, and together they provided a well-rounded leadership core. The quartet has helped the Nittany Lions' program come from a 5-9 record in their freshman season to an improved 12-4, and a No. 1 ranking in the national poll in their junior year, and will look to build upon in 2018.
#BRICKSQUAD MENTALITY
The blue-collar work ethic of Penn State men's lacrosse has been a mainstay under Coach Jeff Tambroni, and even using a brick to symbolize what that means has been in play for a few years, but following the 2017 season, the now-graduated seniors of 2017 gave Tambroni a brick with the engraving "Leave it better than you found it... Class of 2017." "We wanted an identity piece," Tambroni said. "We wanted our program to think about a symbol more visually instead of just conversations with our guys about what we want it to look like. Also, there is a second brick that is passed around by the team to the player with the "most brick mentality" every week. The player who holds the brick chooses who deserves the brick the following week, and they pass the actual brick on to the next deserving player.