For most of the late 1990s, Duke’s men’s lacrosse team was one of the best in the country. With consistent top-10 rankings, frequent appearances in the later stages of the NCAA Tournament and plenty of players on the All-ACC honor roll, head coach Mike Pressler was in charge of one of the healthiest programs around.
But Duke’s record in the last two years has been 13-15, and the team hasn’t been to the NCAA Tournament during that span.
A graph of the program’s success since Pressler became coach in 1991 would begin with a slow, steady climb, as Duke went from an unspectacular program to one of national significance.
The high point came in 1997 when Pressler’s squad made Duke’s first and only Final Four. That was the beginning of a relatively successful stretch. Winning records, All-America players and an annual slot in the NCAA quarterfinals became business as usual.
The graph, however, shows a decline beginning in 2002.
Over some pretty loud grumblings concerning its 8-7 record, Duke managed to squeak into the NCAA Tournament anyway, winning its first-round game with ease.
“Everybody loves to hate Duke, whatever sport,” Pressler said.
The 2003 squad finished 8-7 again but failed to get into the playoffs. It was the first time a Duke team hadn’t made it in six years.
During the following off-season, the team’s two best offensive players transferred to two of the other top programs in the country, Johns Hopkins and Loyola. As the lacrosse world goes, the transfers were pretty huge, if not unprecedented.
All of this led up to Duke’s team last year, which had plenty of talent but not enough experience. With too many freshmen and sophomores in key positions, the Blue Devils, at 5-8, had the worse record of any Duke team in the Pressler era.
“We had a couple of difficult years on the field, but our guys stayed the course.” Presser said.
But this season Duke will be a hungry group and, unlike most years, won’t be on many people’s radars, Pressler said.
Duke should definitely be hungry, especially the team’s 11 juniors, because they have not ever played in the NCAA Tournament—a first for any class under Pressler.
And because of top-notch recruiting classes the last few years in addition to the talented core that never left, the Blue Devils are ranked as high as No. 13 in some preseason polls.
At the very least, renovations on Koskinen Stadium are done and will provide Pressler and company everything from a close place to go during halftime to a locker room for opposing teams, which formerly had to suit up in Cameron Indoor Stadium.
The Blue Devils had five guys make preseason All-America or receive honorable mentions.
The defense has five solid guys—senior Bill Gerrish, whose knee injuries kept him off the field last year, juniors Dave Evans and Glenn Nick and sophomores Tony McDevitt and Casey Carroll—in addition to long-stick midfielder Nick O’Hara.
Junior Matt Zash and sophomore Peter Lamade will be relied upon in the midfield. They will be helped by junior Kyle Dowd, a transfer to Duke from Johns Hopkins. Junior Bret Thompson, junior K.J. Sauer and sophomore Fred Krom will most likely run the second midfield line.
Duke’s offense is centered around on a sophomore, Matt Danowski, the best player in the high school class of 2003. Junior Dan Flannery is in charge of delivering the ball to Danowski and Zack Greer, a left-handed freshman from Canada.
“I don’t know if there’s a better dodger in the sport than Danowski,” said Pressler, who in 2005 is coaching the offense for the first time ever. “And I’m not sure there’s a better feeder than Dan Flannery.”
There are three big challenges between the Blue Devils and a successful season.
In the face-off circle, the team will have to improve upon its 45 percent mark from last year. The task will fall mostly to sophomore Dan Oppesdisano.
Pressler has the enviable dilemma of having three quality goalies to choose from, but he’s got to be careful the way he handles doling out playing time to senior Aaron Fenton, who had some outstanding performances last season, sophomore Dan Loftus and freshman Rob Schroeder.
And lastly, Duke’s playing an ambitious schedule against many highly ranked teams, including the other ACC teams, all of which are ranked in the top six of most preseason polls.
“The goal this year is to make some noise,” Pressler said.
Whether he and the Blue Devils can also make the program into what it once was remains to be seen.
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