Ohio State

Just when Towson thought it had stuck its flag in the ground as a renewed member of the country's elite college lacrosse programs, it ran into a hellbent Ohio State team on the same mission Sunday. Playing in a blustery Ohio Stadium where the 2,800 on hand offered only a hint of the home-field enthusiasm the football Buckeyes enjoy in front of 105,000 in the fall, Ohio State nevertheless prevailed 16-6 in the first-round game of the NCAA lacrosse tournament. The No. 3-seed Buckeyes dominated the second and third quarters, blowing open a game that had been tied 2-2 at one point in the first, on the way to quarterfinal match with Cornell - an upset winner over Maryland - on Saturday at Byrd Stadium in College Park.

Only five programs have repeated as national champion - most recently in 2009 when Syracuse collected back-to-back NCAA titles. Loyola may have been one of the last teams to earn an at-large berth in the upcoming NCAA tournament, but the team has a chance to join the Orange, Johns Hopkins, Cornell, North Carolina and Princeton. “Obviously, that's the ultimate goal,” senior midfielder Davis Butts said Thursday. “The thing is, we have to take it one game at a time with the opponent that is ahead of us and not think about too far down the line because at this point, it's one game or you go home.

The lasting memory Denver players and coaches have of their most recent game was an 11-10 loss to Ohio State that rewarded the Buckeyes with their first Eastern College Athletic Conference tournament and the third seed in the NCAA tournament. The setback did not hurt the Pioneers (12-4) terribly - they still earned the fourth seed and a home game against Albany (13-4) in the first round of the NCAA tournament Saturday - but the loss has lingered a bit. “Anytime you have a tough loss like that, I think it's going to linger for a couple days, but I think with the quick turnaround to the NCAA tournament, we can't really bemoan that loss or think about that loss,” senior attackman Eric Law said Wednesday.

When Carter Brown graduated from Calvert Hall last spring, the Ohio State recruit and Bel Air native was overshadowed by celebrated teammates Patrick Kelly (now with North Carolina) and Ryan Brown (Johns Hopkins). The Tar Heels earned the fifth seed in the NCAA tournament, but Kelly has played in just seven games, scoring five goals. Ryan Brown registered 17 goals and four assists, but the Blue Jays did not earn a spot in the postseason. Meanwhile, Carter Brown has posted 24 goals and 14 assists, and the third-seeded Buckeyes (12-3)

When the 16-team bracket for the NCAA tournament was unveiled Sunday night, Ohio State scooped up the third seed, leapfrogging teams like Eastern College Athletic Conference rival Denver and Atlantic Coast Conference tournament champion North Carolina for the higher seed. It was a remarkable reward for a Buckeyes team (12-3) that was teetering on the fault line for earning an at-large spot in the NCAA tournament. That journey is what makes the Sunday's first-round contest against Towson (10-7)

Combining Maryland's seventh-place finish in the Atlantic Coast Conference last season and the recent decision by 7-foot-1 sophomore center Alex Len to leave early for the NBA, most figured that the Terps would not get a marquee matchup in next season's ACC-Big Ten Challenge. There was also some speculation that Maryland's departure from the ACC after next season for the Big Ten might make the Terps a candidate for exclusion - something that had not happened to Maryland in the first 14 years of the series.

Jim Siedliski is the Big East associate commissioner. He is also the chair of the NCAA selection committee, succeeding former Johns Hopkins and Towson coach Tony Seaman. Siedliski, VMI coach Brian Anken, Ohio State senior associate athletic director Heather Lyke Catalano, Hartford associate athletic director Ellen Crandall and Fairfield athletic director Gene Doris were charged with filling out the 16-team field for the upcoming NCAA tournament. Siedliski addressed the rationale behind awarding the top seed to Syracuse, the deliberations over inviting Duke, Penn State and Loyola instead of Bucknell, Penn and Princeton, and the reasoning involved in leaving Johns Hopkins out of the field for the first time since 1971.

Turner Evans scored his fourth goal, the game-winner, with 24 seconds left as No. 8 Ohio State upset No. 3 and top-seeded Denver, 11-10, in the Eastern College Athletic Conference men's lacrosse championship Saturday in Geneva, N.Y. The win secured the automatic bid to the NCAA tournament for Ohio State. The Buckeyes (12-3) led for most of the first half, until Denver (12-4) tied it at 6 when Wesley Berg (two goals, one assist) scored with 3:02 left in the second quarter. The second half featured four ties, the last, at 10, coming on a goal by Eric Law (two goals, one assist)

After last Saturday's 8-4 victory over No. 13 Johns Hopkins, No. 5 Loyola was thought to be a lock for an at-large bid to the NCAA tournament if the reigning national champion did not repeat as Eastern College Athletic Conference tournament champions this week. Few expected the Greyhounds to fall to No. 8 Ohio State in a conference tournament semifinal, but that is what happened as the Buckeyes pulled off an 18-11 upset at Hobart in Geneva, N.Y., Thursday night. Now Loyola's tournament profile is in question, and it is an unsettling situation for the players and coach Charley Toomey as they await to hear their fate Sunday night when the NCAA selection committee unveils the 16-team field.

The stories started circulating long before John Simon first set foot on Ohio State's campus and became such a program favorite that his head coach talked about naming his next child after him. By the time he got to elementary school, Simon was already performing a daily regimen of pull-ups and sit-ups. He lifted 225 pounds 31 times as a 16-year-old. Before he graduated from high school, he had benched 450 pounds and squatted 700. "People really didn't believe us," said P.J. Fecko, the head football coach at Cardinal Mooney in Youngstown, Ohio.