Regardless of the reasons, NCAA conference realignment is happening and is affecting all sports, including men’s lacrosse.
With the Atlantic Sun conference adding men’s and women’s lacrosse in 2014 and the Big Ten starting lacrosse in 2015, there will now be ten conferences that offer lacrosse, but never before have we seen a shuffle like this.
Let’s try to make sense of the shuffle and how it might affect the 2014 season.
Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC)
With the addition of perennial powerhouses Syracuse and Lacrosse to go along with North Carolina and Duke, the ACC has become the most dominant conference in men’s lacrosse. The ACC conference tournament should be one for the ages in 2014.
These teams will make up the ACC in 2014:
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Duke
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Maryland
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North Carolina
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Notre Dame
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Syracuse
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Virginia
Big East
Perhaps the conference that lost the most, the Big East has seen Syracuse, Notre Dame, and Rutgers walk out the door and into other conferences. Seeing these teams leave had to be a blow for the Big East, but they were able to bring Denver into the conference to add some legitimacy to the Big East lacrosse name.
The Big East conference will look like this in 2014:
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Denver
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Georgetown
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Marquette
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Providence
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St. Johns
- Villanova
Eastern College Athletic Conference (ECAC)
The ECAC took the first of two big blows in the next two years when Loyola and Denver decided to leave the conference and join the Patriot League and the Big East, respectively. Loyola leaves the league one year removed from their national championship and Denver has made multiple NCAA Tournament runs.
The ECAC will take their second big blow in 2015 when the Big Ten begins lacrosse play as Ohio State and Michigan will be bolting for the newly formed conference. Also, Fairfield will be leaving the conference for the Colonial Athletic Association. This will leave the ECAC with only two teams.
The ECAC championship will be decided by these teams in 2014:
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Air Force
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Bellarmine
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Fairfield
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Ohio State
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Michigan
