Cavaliers Host Villanova in First Round of NCAA Championship
Courtesy: VirginiaSports.com
Release: 05/03/2009

CHARLOTTESVILLE, VA—The University of Virginia has received a bid to the 2009 NCAA Men’s Lacrosse Championship and will host Villanova in the first round Sunday (May 10) at 2:30 p.m. at Klöckner Stadium. The game will be televised on ESPNU.

The tournament’s No. 1 seed, Virginia is 13-2 this season and currently tied for fourth in the coaches poll.

This is Virginia’s 32nd tournament appearance overall, second behind Johns Hopkins (38). Virginia won the national championship three years ago and has received a bid in 16 of the last 17 seasons.

Villanova is 11-5 this season. The Wildcats gained an automatic bid after winning the Colonial Athletic Association tournament with a 10-9 win over Towson in the championship game yesterday. They upset Hofstra 9-7 in the first round of the tournament. Four of Villanova’s five losses have been by two goals or less this season, while three of its wins have been by a goal.

This is Villanova’s first appearance in the NCAA Championship.

The teams have met one time previously, a 21-6 Virginia win to start the 1993 season in the first game of the Dom Starsia era at Virginia.

The winner of this game faces the winner of Saturday’s Brown at Johns Hopkins game in the quarterfinals at Navy on Sunday (May 17). The quarterfinals will be televised on ESPNU.

Fans may purchase tickets beginning at 9 a.m. on Monday in person at the Virginia Athletics Ticket Office in Bryant Hall or by calling (800) 542-8821. Tickets can also be purchased online at VirginiaSports.com on Monday beginning at 9 a.m. Reserved seat tickets offering stadium chair seating under cover are $9 each; general admission tickets are $7 for adults and $5 for youth 18-and-under, seniors 60-and-over and students of participating schools with a valid student ID.

Parking for the lacrosse game is $5 and is available at University Hall and John Paul Jones Arena.

 

Cavs top seed in NCAA tournament
By Jeff White
Published: May 4, 2009

CHARLOTTESVILLE -- The University of Virginia men's lacrosse team's recent losses to Duke didn't dissuade the NCAA selection committee. U.Va. is seeded No. 1 in the NCAA tournament, whose 16-team field was announced last night.

Virginia (13-2) will host Colonial Athletic Association champion Villanova (11-5) at 2:30 p.m. Sunday at Klockner Stadium. ESPNU will televise the first-round game.

Both of the Cavaliers' losses were to Duke, and neither game was close. The Blue Devils romped 16-10 at Durham, N.C., on April 11. Duke embarrassed U.Va. 16-5 in the ACC tournament semifinals at Chapel Hill about two weeks later.

"I think we're all anxious to start playing well again," Virginia coach Dom Starsia said last night.

Defending NCAA champion Syracuse is seeded No. 2. The other seeded teams: No. 3 Duke, No. 4 Princeton, No. 5 Cornell, No. 6 North Carolina, No. 7 Notre Dame and No. 8 Johns Hopkins.

U.Va. beat Syracuse, Cornell, UNC and Hopkins during the regular season.

Hopkins, last year's NCAA runner-up, hosts Brown, Starsia's alma mater, in the first round. The U.Va.-Villanova winner will meet the Hopkins-Brown winner in a quarterfinal May 17 in Annapolis, Md.

Virginia and Villanova have met only once in men's lacrosse, on Feb. 28, 1993. That was Starsia's first game as coach of the Wahoos, who crushed the Wildcats 21-6 in Charlottesville. This will be Villanova's first appearance in the NCAA tourney.

U.Va. has won three NCAA titles under Starsia and four overall. The Cavaliers' most recent championship came in 2006. They lost to Delaware in the NCAA tournament's first round in '07 and to Syracuse, in double overtime, in last year's semifinals.

Virginia, now tied for fourth in the U.S. Intercollegiate Lacrosse Association coaches' poll, hasn't played since losing to Duke in the ACC tournament.

"We slipped in the polls a little bit the past couple of weeks, understandably so," Starsia said. "Polls reflect more, 'What have you done for me lately?' But when you looked at the whole season, I thought we did have the strongest case [for the No. 1 seed]."

The NCAA semifinals will be May 23 and the championship game May 25 in Foxborough, Mass.

 

Cavaliers to Face Duke in NCAA First Round
Courtesy: VirginiaSports.com
Release: 05/03/2009

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. - The No. 10 Virginia women’s lacrosse team earned an at-large bid into the 2009 NCAA Tournament Sunday evening and will travel to fifth-seed Duke in first round action. The game will be played on Sunday, May 10 in Durham, N.C.

Virginia brings an 11-7 record into the contest, while Duke is 13-5.

The at-large bid marks the 14th-straight year the Cavaliers have participated in the NCAA Tournament, and 21st overall. Virginia holds an all-time record of 28-18 in the postseason and has played the second-most tournament games among any other team in the nation.

Against the Blue Devils, the Cavaliers saw a three-game win streak against their conference-foe come to an end, as they fell, 13-12, at home to then-No. 5 Duke on March 28.

Virginia holds the all-time series record at 17-7, though, and the two have faced at least twice in every year since 2001. The Cavaliers have won all but one of those postseason battles – a 6-9 defeat in the 2005 ACC Tournament Title game.

Virginia has faced Duke three times in NCAA Tournament games, winning all three in the semifinals, including staging the largest comeback win in tournament history – a 10-goal run to erase a nine-goal deficit in 2005.

The winner of the contest will advance to the quarterfinal round to face the winner of the No. 2 seed Penn vs. Fairfield game on Saturday, May 16. The semifinals and finals are scheduled for Towson University on May 22-24.

 

Former Virginia tackle Monroe enjoying first Jags minicamp
The Orlando Sentinel
May 3, 2009

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. - Jacksonville Jaguars coach Jack Del Rio has made a point this week to say he likes getting rookies to minicamp to get some "shock" value on what life is like in the NFL.

So far Eugene Monroe has enjoyed taking his first minicamp jolts.

"I had fun," Monroe, the team's first-round pick from Virginia, said as the Jaguars started work this weekend. "I got a chance to get in and get some reps working with the twos (second teamers), got to watch Tra Thomas a little bit and learn from him. It was fun, I had fun."

Part of the fun is getting to know some of the players, such as quarterback David Garrard, running back Maurice Jones-Drew and others.

"Yeah, it was cool to see them, even just coming into the locker room the other day and getting a chance to be with those guys who I've been seeing on TV and now they are my teammates," Monroe said.

Part of the shock is working with the second team, which Monroe said he hasn't done "in a while."

For Del Rio, those type of experiences are what constitute part of the shock and he's happy to give it the week after the draft.

"I think it gives the rookie class a little bit of that where they come in and see guys for the first time and the speed of the game and the size of the athletes and the fact that guys have been here working together and they know the system," said Del Rio, a former linebacker. "So, they're behind, and I think that's good for them to feel that. I call it the shock factor because I probably recalled it when I was a rookie."

The team, whether on purpose or not, put Monroe's locker next to Thomas, an 11-year veteran the Jaguars signed as a free agent in the offseason.

"I didn't think about that (the placement being intentional), but yeah, it probably was," said Monroe, who will graduate May 17 with a degree in sociology.

For the 6-5, 309-pound Monroe, only the second offensive lineman chosen by the Jaguars in the first round in franchise history (Tony Boselli was the first in their inaugural 1995 season), that's a good thing because he can absorb a lot.

"You sit back, you watch, you ask questions," he said. "And, he's willing to help, anything I ask. My locker's right next to his and I think that's pretty cool."

Thomas says if the team wants him to mentor, he'll mentor but he's quick to point out he's new here, too, and mentoring isn't his top priority.

"If that's what they want me to do," Thomas said. "If you want to pay me to be a mentor, that's cool. If you want to pay me to be a big brother I have no problem with that. If they came to me and said they want me to be a mentor that's fine, but right now we're competing for a job."

Coming on board in the draft was fellow tackle and second round pick Eben Britton from Arizona. Both Monroe and Britton are thankful they have each other to learn together with.

"We actually studied (the playbook together) just trying to learn things," Monroe said. "It's good to have somebody who's coming in here fresh with me. Hopefully we can have a long career here together."

"I'm really excited," Britton said. "On Sunday after the draft we got in touch with each other and we're just super-excited to be working together and have a chance to make each other better. Hopefully, we'll play on the offensive line for the Jaguars for a long time, so it's exciting."

Del Rio, too, has his eyes on the future.

"At some point those two guys will be our bookends," he said. "At some point. But, we're going to let them earn that through good competition."