The Virginia men's lacrosse team's tough early-season schedule continues Saturday night when the No. 8 Cavaliers travel to Baltimore to take on No. 6 Johns Hopkins at 8 p.m.
After starting the season with an impressive 12-8 win over No. 19 Towson, the Cavaliers (2-3) dropped three consecutive decisions to top five teams.
"It was difficult to play Syracuse, Princeton and Notre Dame this early in the season," senior midfielder Hanley Holcomb said. "We've got a pretty inexperienced team, but I think we've grown up a little bit from each loss."
A commanding 15-5 win over Denver on March 18 gave the Cavaliers a big confidence boost heading into this Saturday's matchup. Holcomb's four goals and junior midfielder Conor Gill's five assists led the offensive explosion.
"We showed ourselves [against Denver] that we can play at the top level," Holcomb said. "We've showed it in spurts so far this season, but we need to be consistently at that level to be considered up there with Syracuse and Princeton. [The Denver game] was the start of something good for us for the rest of the season."
The Blue Jays (2-1) are coming off an emotional 11-10 victory over No. 1 Syracuse at the Carrier Dome that snapped the Orangemen's 11-game winning streak. Senior midfielder Eric Wedin scored five goals and recorded one assist to lead the Hopkins attack.
The Blue Jays return three players who garnered All-American honors last year: senior midfielder Conor Denihan and senior defensemen Brandon Testa and Brendan Shook.
Virginia coach Dom Starsia highlights the importance of winning face-offs and getting to ground balls in Saturday's game. Hopkins holds a 106-80 advantage against its opponents in winning ground balls this season.
The Blue Jays won 57.1 percent (32-of-56) of their face-offs through the first two games of the season. Virginia senior midfielder David Jenkins - the Cavaliers' face-off specialist - is injured, and Starsia is unsure of what his status will be for Saturday's game.
Though the Virginia defense has taken some criticism for its play to date, Starsia says he is pleased with the development of his relatively inexperienced defense and freshman goalkeeper Tillman Johnson.
"We've really been playing pretty solidly" on the defensive end, Starsia said. "The defense has actually been playing more consistently than the offense."
Starsia is quick to dispel any doubts about the ability of his keeper.
"Tillman has done a great job to date," Starsia said. "He's had a tough first few games. It's not easy to break in against teams like Syracuse and Princeton."
Holcomb says the difficult losses have provided an opportunity for the team to pull together.
"We still have the opportunity to achieve all of the goals we set at the beginning of the season," Holcomb said. "If we win the rest of our games, we can be a top-four seed for the NCAA tournament and receive a first-round bye. Our two main goals for this season are to be in the best position to win both the ACC and NCAA tournaments"
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