Michigan's 2023 Late-Season Run Didn't Happen by Accident

Michael Boehm scored a Michigan-record eight goals in last year’s 19-14 victory over rival Ohio State. But the real story is what happened before — five days before, to be precise.

Five days before the win over the Buckeyes, Michigan saw a four-goal lead slip away in an 11-9 home loss to Penn State. Boehm missed all eight of his shots, including two opportunities in the fourth quarter that haunted him.

So, long after the final horn had sounded in that Penn State loss, Boehm was still at the school’s lacrosse facility. Next to him was a bucket of balls and an empty net. He kept shooting the shots he missed, until he had buried every single one of the balls in the bucket.

“It was one of those moments where you feel like at the end of the game that you had a direct impact on what happened with the result,” Boehm said. “I just think it was something that I felt like I had to make right. I think the only way to build confidence is through hard work and preparation, knowing that you’ve done it over and over again. That was a good reset for me to take a step back, put in some more work to move on and to move forward.”

That Boehm handled the loss that way was of no surprise to Michigan head coach Kevin Conry.

“He stayed and he bore the brunt of the loss on his shoulders,” Conry said. “That’s the way he is. He never points a finger, he points a thumb. I’m usually one of the last guys to leave, but I saw he was still down there working. I went down there to make sure he was okay. He’s a guy that you see all the hard work and it shows up on the field.”

A poor shooting effort has been the exception more than the norm for Boehm. The 6-foot senior attackman has gotten better every year he’s been in Ann Arbor.

A highly coveted recruit, Boehm scored 36 points (21 goals, 15 assists) as a freshman and then bumped that up to 63 (33 goals, 30 assists) as a sophomore. Last year, he really broke through, setting career highs with 45 goals and 73 points to earn honorable mention All-America honors. But individual honors mean little to Boehm, who bleeds maize and blue.

His sister, Britt, played on the WCLA team at Michigan. Her husband, Trevor Yealy, was a stalwart on Michigan’s dominant MCLA teams and then served as a captain for Team One, Michigan’s first varsity team in 2012.

“I've been coming up to Michigan since I was 6, and I would go to all of [Britt’s] games and all of Trevor’s games, so I was kind of a brainwashed Michigan fan for life,” Boehm said. “That was my initial push to the school, but as I came up here, I really believed that this was something you could build.”

And that’s part of what made the Ohio State win so special — not the eight goals. The Penn State loss was Michigan’s second in a row, coming on the heels of an overtime loss to Rutgers. Prior to that, Michigan had landed a signature 16-11 win at reigning national champion Maryland. Would that big win just be a blip, or could Michigan build on it?

“Handling success is something we’ve always struggled with,” Conry said, who became the team’s head coach in 2018. “My first year, we beat Notre Dame, the second year we beat Ohio State, then we beat Johns Hopkins.”

There would be no one-and-done in 2023.

“The opportunity to string wins together was a big part of our season,” Conry said. “It was great to see the snowball start rolling.”

The Ohio State win was indeed the start of a snowball. They edged the Buckeyes again the following week to kick off the Big Ten tournament. Next up, they outscored Penn State 17-15 in the Big Ten semifinals with Boehm leading the way with three goals and three assists to avenge his earlier showing against the Nittany Lions.

In the Big Ten championship game, Michigan left no doubt that the program had taken a major leap forward, dominating Maryland 14-5 to win the league and advance to the NCAA tournament for the first time in program history.

They weren’t content with just being in the NCAA tournament, opening with a 15-14 overtime win against Cornell before the season ended with a loss to Duke in the quarterfinals.

The whole run was magical, capturing the attention of the lacrosse world and those associated with the Michigan program.

“It was pretty cool with my sister and Trevor in the stands, and I think a pretty neat thing Trevor and I have is that we were able to kind of reenergize and revitalize a lot of the alumni connection with the team,” Boehm said. “I feel like we felt that history more so last year than any other year. Definitely myself, without a doubt, but the whole team I think felt it and how much it meant for everybody that’s been a part of this this program — since the club days.”

Boehm’s late night shooting session also furthered the connection. John Paul, the longtime club coach at Michigan who led the team for its first six varsity seasons, told Boehm about Yealy doing the same thing after a tough loss to Loyola in Michigan’s inaugural varsity season.

“Trevor and I aren’t even blood-related, but maybe there’s a little inheritance that’s coming from that or just him rubbing off on me,” Boehm said.

Boehm’s hard work is a great example of leadership, but there are so many qualities that make him the leader he’s become for the program. Perhaps his positivity is what most jumps off the chart.

“He’s got an award-winning personality, and it feels like he’s never had a bad day in his life,” Conry said. “With his positivity, he has an ability to just pull people around him and help them improve. That’s really what makes him a great lacrosse player.”

He’s not alone. Michigan has a talented senior class — it was the No. 3 recruiting class in the country by Inside Lacrosse when they were freshmen — and they’ve brought in some grad transfers with experience and leadership backgrounds. It’s a perfect recipe for Conry so that Michigan can sustain its success.

“The guys are driving the bus,” Conry said. “They understand what we did and know how hard it will be going forward. We’re no longer Cinderella. The good news is, our leaders are starting early. Since June, they’ve been making sure guys are staying on top of their workouts, indoctrinating the news guys on the roster so that we can hit our stride by the end of fall entering the season.”

“Two or three days after the season was over, we were all back in Ann Arbor, and we had a senior only meeting and talked about just what we wanted out of the summer as the first step,” Boehm said. “Rolling into the fall, I think we executed on a lot of those points, and I think the whole senior class has taken that next step as leaders of the program. I think we all realize that we’re not satisfied with just winning a Big Ten championship. We have a lot higher goals, and I don’t think any of us are afraid to say that we believe we can win a national championship here.”