Quick Hits About The 'Hounds
- Loyola University Maryland opens its ninth season of competition in the Patriot League on Saturday, March 5, with a trip to Easton, Pennsylvania, where it will face Lafayette College. The game is set for a 12 p.m. faceoff on ESPN+.
- Bailey Savio continues to move closer to the school record for faceoffs won, set in 2017 by his older brother, Graham. The younger Savio currently has 660 to the elder's 709.
- Kevin Lindley now has three of the top-25 season goal totals in school history: 37 in 2018, 60 in 2019, 42 in 2021. He is in his fourth full season, fifth overall, at Loyola as the school's career leader in goals with 165.
- Aidan Olmstead was one off his career-high of eight points in the Greyhounds' February 26 game against Rutgers, with two goals and five assists. The assists mark tied a career-best.
- The Greyhounds have averaged 12.2 wins per season over the last nine full seasons (excluding the shortened 2020 campaign). That stretch includes the 2012 NCAA Championship, NCAA Semifinal appearances in 2012 and 2016 and NCAA Quarterfinal appearances in 2012, 2016, 2018, 2019 and 2021.
Last Time Out
- Kevin Lindley scored the 165th goal of his career in the second quarter, breaking the Patriot League's all-time record, but Towson dealt Loyola an 11-8 setback on Wednesday night at Ridley Athletic Complex.
- Lindley got his stick on a loose ball at the crease and scooped it in for a goal to break the record of 164 set by Colgate University's Peter Baum (2009-12).
- The goal was Loyola's second in 10 seconds after Joey Kamish had an unassisted goal , and it brought the Greyhounds to a 6-5 lead. The Tigers, however, came back with an unassisted goal by Kyle Berkeley at 1:37 to tie the score at 6-6 going into halftime. That goal started a 4-0 Towson run and would help it build a 9-6 lead on Berkeley's third of the evening with 4:38 to play in the third.
- Loyola got back within two, 9-7, when Adam Poitras beat the shot clock buzzer with a deep goal off an Evan James assist at 2:22.
- The margin stayed at two for more than half a quarter until the Tigers scored on extra-man at 7:50 in the fourth. James Avanzato scored his second of the night on a Luke Shilling assist, and Towson was ahead 10-7.
In The Polls
- Loyola is receiving votes in both the USILA coaches poll and the Inside Lacrosse rankings entering Saturday's game.
- Lafayette comes into the game unranked.
Series History
- Loyola and Lafayette will meet for the 11th time in series history on Saturday with the Greyhounds having won the previous 10 meetings.
- The teams first played in 1939, Loyola's second season of intercollegiate lacrosse, and then they did not play again until 2014, Loyola's initial year in the Patriot League.
- The programs met twice during the COVID-adapted 2021 schedule. Loyola won a March 13 meeting at Ridley Athletic Complex, 16-6, before taking an April 24 decision in Easton, 11-7, in the teams' regular-season finale.
- Saturday's game will be the Greyhounds fifth at Fisher Stadium.
Standing On Top
- Kevin Lindley dodged from the top of the box, split a double and scored with 3:31 left in the first half of the 2021 Patriot League Quarterfinal against Navy, setting a school record in the process. His goal pushed him past the career total of Gary Hanley who scored 151 goals for 1978-81 and held the career goals scored record for 40 years.
- This year, on March 2 against Towson, Lindley set the Patriot League career goals scored record with his 165th goal, eclipsing the total from 2009-12 by Colgate's Peter Baum. The 2012 Tewaaraton Award winner scored his 164 in 62 games, while Lindley's came in his 60th career game.
- Lindley became the 11th player in program history to reach 100 goals in a career when he scored his first goal on February 15, 2020 against Johns Hopkins, reaching the 100-goal plateau in just his 36th career game, the fastest in Loyola history after Gary Hanley reached the plateau in his 39th career game (1980). Hanley got to his total of 151 goals in 57 career games, while Lindley took 52 to hit that mark.
- Lindley finished his freshman season in 2018 with 37 goals, had a school-record 60 as a sophomore in 2019, 19 in the truncated 2020 campaign and 42 in 16 games last season.
- Lindley has scored three or more goals in 29 of his 60 career games.
Aidan Is All Around
- Aidan Olmstead posted two 40-plus point seasons in 2018 and 2019, and he then led the Greyhounds in points with 22 during the shortened 2020 season. Last season, he hit the 60-point mark for the first time with 31 goals and 29 assists for 60 points. In 57 career games, Olmstead has scored 183 points with 90 goals and 93 assists, ranking fourth all-time at the school in assists and tied for sixth in points. With three points, he will move into fourth all-time in that category, too.
- After being hampered by an injury early in 2019, Olmstead posted 18 goals and 13 assists in the Greyhounds' last nine games, bringing his season totals to 23 and 21.
- In 2018, Olmstead finished his freshman season with 19 goals and 21 assists in 17 games.
- The native of Painted Post, New York, now has 22 games with two or more assists, 24 with multiple goals and 10 career hat tricks. Among those games, he has 38 outings with three or more points, 13 of those coming against Patriot League opponents.
- Olmstead was named the Patriot League Scholar-Athlete of the Year in 2021, and he is not the only member of his family within the Loyola athletic department. His twin sisters, Riley and Logan are juniors on the Loyola women's lacrosse team.
Another Ascending The Leaderboard
- Bailey Savio set the Loyola career record for ground balls in the 2021 Patriot League Semifinal win as he picked up six to boost his career total to 341, one more than his older brother Graham had from 2014-17.
- Now with 379 entering the Wednesday's game, the younger Savio is third all-time in the Patriot League in the category behind Lehigh's Conor Gaffney (391, 2017-2021) and Colgate's Peter Strid (384, 1993-96).
- Savio, with 660, is also second all-time at Loyola in faceoffs won behind his brother's 709. He is fourth in Patriot League history behind Graham, Gaffney (669) and Colgate's Chris Eck's 664.
Rezanka Racks Up Caused Turnovers
- Payton Rezanka averaged more than two caused turnovers per game in the Greyhounds' first three this season and is leading Loyola with seven. He had three in each of the first two games against Maryland and Johns Hopkins. Last year, he had a career-high 15 caused turnovers.
Making Of A Roster
- Loyola's roster of 51 players – the largest in program history – is replete with 41 of 49 players from last year's squad.
- The Greyhounds locker room boasts so many players this year thanks in part to the additional year of eligibility players received due to the 2020 season being shortened due to COVID-19.
- Nine players returned to Loyola this year to compete as graduate students with a tenth coming back as a sixth-year player. Ryan McNulty will spend his sixth year with the team after compiling a medical hardship waiver for a fifth year (due to injury in 2017 as a freshman) and the his 2020 waiver.
- This year's team consists of nine freshmen, 12 sophomores, 11 juniors, nine seniors and 10 graduate students.
- A total of 17 states or provinces are represented on the Greyhounds' 2022 roster with Maryland, New York and Connecticut leading the way with nine, eight and seven, respectively. Four states – New Jersey, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Virginia – and one Canadian province – Ontario – have three players each on the roster, while California, Colorado and Ohio all have two. Illinois, Maine, Michigan, Oregon, South Carolina and Texas are all represented once.
Sideline Longevity
- Loyola also has one of the longest tenured coaching staffs in NCAA lacrosse with the group of Charley Toomey, Matt Dwan and Marc Van Arsdale having been together since 2017. Of the teams ranked in the top-20 of the USILA Preseason Poll, only the staff at Duke has been together longer; the group at Virginia has been together for six years, as well.
- Add Volunteer Assistant Coach Steve Vaikness and Director of Operations Chris Myers, and the staff has spent 72 years coaching at Loyola (including Toomey's nine seasons as an assistant coach). Toomey, Dwan, Myers and Vaikness are all Loyola graduates, giving the crew 17 more years of time on the Evergreen campus.
Higher Learning
- As mentioned before, 10 members of the Greyhounds' roster are enrolled at Loyola as graduate students after earning their bachelor's degrees at the school: Matthew Benus (Bachelor of Business Administration in Economics; ,M.B.A. in finance), Matt Hughes (B.B.A., management; M.B.A., management), Kyle LeBlanc (B.S., applied mathematics; M.S., data science), Kevin Lindley (B.A., political science; M.B.A.), Ryan McNulty (B.A., communications; M.A., emerging media), Aidan Olmstead (B.B.A., international business & global studies; M.B.A.), Bailey Savio (B.B.A., management; M.B.A., finance), Sam Shafer (B.A., communications; M.B.A., finance), Adam Wagner (B.B.A., marketing; M.B.A., finance) and Dan Wigley (B.B.A, finance; M.B.A.)
Between The Lines
- Ryan McNulty has been key to the Greyhounds' defense and transition game since joining the program in 2017, earning his All-America honors (USILA honorable mention) in 2020, 2021 (Inside Lacrosse Second Team) and 2022 (USILA, Inside Lacrosse and USA Lacrosse Magazine Second Team) as a long-stick midfielder. Since the start of 2019, he has been the team's leader (among non-faceoff players) with 143 ground balls while leading Loyola with 57 caused turnovers.
- Over his career, he has amassed 72 caused turnovers and 198 ground balls while scoring 12 goals to go with 12 assists. He's tied for sixth all-time at Loyola in caused turnovers, and is 13th in ground balls.
New Position, No Problem
- Evan James shifted to attack to make the first start there of his collegiate career on February 20, 2021, against Virginia, and the sophomore finished with three goals and an assist. The Ohio native needed just six shots for his first collegiate hat trick.
- He followed that performance with a five-goal, six-point game against Utah, a contest in which he scored on all but one of his shots. He matched the six points with four goals and two assists versus Lafayette.
- In last year's season-opener at Richmond, James made his first career start, this coming in the midfield where he played in all six games during 2020, posting three goals and five ground balls.
- He earned All-Patriot League Second Team recognition after finishing second on the team with 32 goals and third with 44 points, and he was a Preseason All-Patriot League player this spring.
Breaking Out Of The Midfield
- Adam Poitras had his freshman season, during which he was a starter on the Greyhounds' first midfield, cut shot by the COVID pandemic after he'd scored five goals and dished out seven assists through six games.
- He played in all 16 games as a sophomore in 2021, but his production was hampered as he came back from offeseason surgery. As he became healthier throughout the year, his point production increased and he had eight goals and eight assists in the last seven games of the season. That included three three-point games against Navy, Army West Point and Denver.
- This season, Poitras started the year with two goals and an assist at Maryland, and he went for a career-high four goals on February 26 against Rutgers. Currently, he leads the team with eight goals, and he is second with 10 points.
Little Bit Of Everything
- Joey Kamish has shown his versatility this year while playing on both the attack and first midfield units. He flashed his goal-scoring ability at Johns Hopkins by scoring three times, and he did it from the distributing end a week later versus Rutgers with a career-high three assists.
- In 15 career games, Kamish has scored 22 goals and assisted on 12 for 34 total points.
Toomey's Team
- Charley Toomey is in his 17th year as the head coach at Loyola and his 26th as a member of the Greyhounds' coaching staff. Overall, he is in his 30th year on the Evergreen campus, including his four seasons as a student-athlete from 1986-90.
- Toomey has directed the Greyhounds to 160 wins, an average of 12.3 per season (not including the shortened 2020 season) since 2012, and has a 160-81 career record. Early in the 2016 season, Toomey became the second coach in program history to reach and cross the 100-win plateau; he stands second on the program's all-time wins chart behind his college coach, Dave Cottle (181-70, 1983-2001).
- As a head coach, Toomey has coached 48 USILA All-Americans, 85 all-conference selections, 21 conference positional or players or rookies of the year, a Tewaaraton Award winner and five finalists and 22 USILA Scholar All-Americans.
- In January 2019, Toomey was named to the coaching staff of the U.S. Men's National Team as an assistant coach. He will serve with Team USA in preparation for, and competition in, the 2022 World Championships in British Columbia. He was also enshrined in the USLacrosse Chesapeake Chapter Hall of Fame in January 2019 for his accomplishments as a player and a coach.
Get To Ten
- Since Charley Toomey became head coach at Loyola in 2006, the Greyhounds have scored 10 or more goals on 151 occasions; Loyola has won 80.1 percent of those games (121-30).
Up Next
- Loyola returns to Ridley Athletic Complex for the first of three-straight home games, starting with a Saturday, March 12, date with Duke University.
