The Division I men’s quarterfinals are set.

There are four teams from the ACC, two from the Big Ten and the Big East champion.

And then there’s Loyola, riding a five-game winning streak and continuing its rise from oblivion after a fairly forgettable two months to begin the season.

The Greyhounds’ 14-13 victory at Denver was how the eight-game opening weekend schedule ended, but it’s the right place to begin rewinding how the quarterfinals were set up.

BEST GAME
Loyola vs. Denver

It’s certainly the game that had the most threads — and the most interesting threads — winding through the game.

Loyola was one of the last teams into the field, but it had to withdraw from its Patriot League final because of a positive virus test.

Denver fielded perhaps the most super-sized of all the expanded rosters this spring and was as active on the transfer wire as much as anyone not named Duke or Notre Dame.

One of those pickups was faceoff specialist TD Ierlan, who played in NCAA tournaments at Albany and Yale. He helped Denver erase a five-goal halftime deficit with one last brilliant college performance, winning 17 of 19 draws.

Loyola was a little more than a month removed from benching goalie Sam Shafer in the first quarter of a loss to Army. He returned at halftime of the Greyhounds’ next game, settled into a far better groove and ultimately made one of the saves of the year in the closing seconds against the Pioneers’ Alex Simmons.

Impressively, Loyola never permitted Denver to knot it up despite pulling within a goal on three occasions (11-10, 13-12 and 14-13). The Greyhounds’ ability to withstand the Pioneers and their pressure — their faceoff dominance, an offense featuring Jack Hannah, Jackson Morrill, Ethan Walker and more — made the fourth quarter the most riveting sequence of the weekend.

NOTABLE NEAR-MISS
Notre Dame vs. Drexel

Anyone who saw Drexel over the last month and a half of the season realized the Dragons possessed a dangerous mix heading into the NCAA tournament.

They had multiple attackmen who could take over games. Their balance was admirable, especially since they were largely healthy. They’d won nine in a row, so there was no doubt they felt good. They’d rallied to win a couple games this month, so a deficit wasn’t going to faze them.

Those factors all influenced how things played out against Notre Dame. Reid Bowering scored four goals to help Drexel rally from a four-goal deficit to tie it. All but one of their six starters on offense found the net. And while Notre Dame never trailed after the first five minutes, Drexel applied pressure.

It’s a credit to just how good the Dragons were in 2021 that they did so. It’s just as much a credit to Notre Dame that it survived 10-8, getting a Wheaton Jackoboice goal with 1:19 to go before Morrison Mirer threw one into an empty net in the final minute for an insurance goal.

Now the Irish head home to face Maryland in a quarterfinal pairing two teams that pride themselves on discipline and good decision-making — but also have a Tewaaraton finalist on attack capable of creating problems for even the best defenses.

BIGGEST SURPRISE
Rutgers’ margin of victory

The Scarlet Knights thoroughly bottled up eighth-seeded Lehigh in a 12-5 victory. The absence of Mountain Hawks attackman Tommy Schelling didn’t help matters. But even if he had played, Rutgers probably doesn’t have to sweat things out in the game’s late stages.

It was a standout afternoon for the Scarlet Knights’ defense, which doesn’t get as much attention as the AARP (Attackman Association of Rutgers Postgraduates) unit on offense. It had also allowed double-digit goals in five of its last six games. Put simply, Rutgers was bigger and stronger than Lehigh in those matchups (and goalie Colin Kirst’s 17 saves helped, too).

Re-litigating selection committee decisions isn’t always a great idea. But for those Big Ten partisans who would like to anyway, this was a welcome barometer on how the league’s second-best team stacked up. A much tougher gauge awaits in Saturday’s quarterfinals when the Scarlet Knights face North Carolina.

SURPRISE THAT WASN’T
Syracuse laying an egg

The first-round score that pops off the page more than any other is fifth-seeded Georgetown’s 18-8 pounding of Syracuse. That isn’t supposed to happen to the Orange, a member of college lacrosse royalty with only one other loss by a double-digit margin in the NCAA tournament (a 19-8 stumble against Johns Hopkins in the 2003 semifinals).

Yet for anyone paying attention, the manner of Syracuse’s exit can’t be considered a true stunner. The Orange had already lost four games by at least seven goals. How surprising could a fifth be in a pairing with the potent Hoyas who ultimately ran circles around Syracuse’s defensive personnel?

Which brings up the really unsettling development for Syracuse: That seeing it get its clock cleaned easily falls into the spectrum of believable events. It’s been a long, long time since that’s been the case.

BEST INDIVIDUAL PERFORMANCE
Michael Sowers, Duke

Five years into his college career, Sowers finally got to make his NCAA tournament debut. It was memorable, too, with the Blue Devils attackman collecting four goals and four assists in a 16-10 victory.

There was no stat-padding for Sowers. He scored Duke’s first two goals and four of its first five. He played a part in eight of the Blue Devils’ first nine goals, getting all of his points before halftime.

Other notable offensive performances: North Carolina’s Chris Gray (four goals, two assists against Monmouth); Georgetown’s Jake Carraway and Declan McDermott (five goals each against Syracuse); Maryland’s Jared Bernhardt (six goals, one assist against Vermont); and Loyola’s Aidan Olmstead (five goals at Denver)

BEST POSITION PERFORMANCE
Goalies

It was a good weekend for many of the netminders in the tournament, especially on Saturday. North Carolina’s Collin Krieg made 15 saves while allowing just two goals against Monmouth. Then came a pair of duels: Rutgers’ Colin Kirst and Lehigh’s James Spence both stopped 17 shots, and then Notre Dame’s Liam Entenmann (17 saves) and Drexel’s Ross Blumenthal (15 saves) were fantastic in the Irish’s 10-8 victory.

Sunday’s action was nearly as good for goalies. Virginia’s Alex Rode saved 18 shots against Bryant, and Duke’s Mike Adler had 14 stops against High Point. And, of course, there was Loyola’s Sam Shafer halting 16 shots — and memorably denying Simmons the tying goal with four seconds left to preserve the Greyhounds’ 14-13 triumph.

SAM SHAFER WITH THE SAVE OF A LIFETIME. WOW. @LoyolaMLAX survives at the buzzer, downs @DU_MLAX 14-13. pic.twitter.com/48DdspfHts

— USA Lacrosse Magazine (@USALacrosseMag) May 17, 2021

NUMBERS OF NOTE

3

There are three remaining teams in the NCAA tournament field that have not won a national title. Notre Dame has come the closest, with five final four appearances and runner-up finishes in 2010 and 2014. Georgetown has only one semifinal appearance (1999), while Rutgers has never made it out of the quarterfinals.

7-11

Syracuse is 7-11 in the NCAA tournament since winning the 2009 national title. That includes just one trip beyond the quarterfinals (a runner-up finish in 2013) and a pedestrian 5-6 mark in first-round games.

13-0

Maryland is 13-0 for the first time in program history after defeating Vermont 17-11. The Terrapins’ previous best start to a year was 1987, when they went 12-0 before falling to Johns Hopkins in the NCAA semifinals.

31

North Carolina’s 16-4 margin over Monmouth was its most lopsided NCAA tournament victory in 31 years. The last time prior to Saturday the Tar Heels had won a postseason game by more than a dozen was an 18-3 rout of Harvard in the 1990 quarterfinals.

50

Jake Carraway hit the 50-goal plateau for the season in Georgetown’s 18-8 rout of Syracuse, the first player in Hoya history to do so twice in a career. Carraway owns two of Georgetown’s four 50-goal seasons, doing so in 2019 and 2021. Steve Dusseau (2002) and Daniel Bucaro (2018) also accomplished the feat.