Di Miller, PLL Correspondent & Photographer
Lacrosse is Awesome©
Featured Image Photo Credit: David Stewart, Lacrosse is Awesome©
Photos Courtesy of the PLL
We’re getting down to the wire in the 2024 PLL Season and this weekend, the Maryland Whipsnakes (3-4) will host the league at Homewood Field in Baltimore, MD Saturday August 3, 2024, and Sunday August 4, 2024. There’ll be a lot going on this weekend as well, including the PLL Junior Championships and some Hall of Fame inductions. Brendan Mundorf former attackmen of the MLL Denver Outlaws for eight seasons 2006 thru 2013 & Chesapeake Bayhawks in 2014, alongside with Lee Zink also a former defenseman for the Outlaws and Josh Sims who also played with the Outlaws for 5 years will all be inducted into the Hall of Fame.
Now, what we’ve seen so far this season, only one team has one both of the games in their home city, the New York Atlas (6-2) who on opening weekend would defeat the Boston Cannons 19-12 and the Maryland Whipsnakes 17-13. The Philadelphia Waterdogs (1-6) lost both of their games in Week 3 when they went up against the California Redwoods 11-12 and the Whipsnakes 14-15. On each of the other weekends, the home team split their games. So, is homefield really an advantage considering the home team plays both days? It doesn’t seem so up through last weekend.
The playoff race is heating up with two teams having already clinched, the Atlas and Cannons. The Dogs have a 16.5% chance of making the playoffs and would be eliminated this weekend if all of the following play out: a) They lose to the Whipsnakes; b) The Denver Outlaws (3-3) defeat the Redwoods (3-4); c) and the Carolina Chaos (3-4) defeat the Utah Archers (4-2). The other five teams’ chances are much better with predictions showing Utah, Maryland and Denver with an 85% or higher chance to lock it in. Chaos is coming in at 66.54% with the Redwoods lagging at 36.85%. Therefore, this weekends games are extremely important for those middle teams with records all around the 3-4 mark.
So, let’s take a look at the Week 8 Lineups:
The Week 8 Injury Report only has the Dogs, Outlaws, Cannons, Chaos & Archers each with players questionable or “out”.
So, what about the Standings, Conference and League? When you look at the “league” standings, you can see Denver hanging out at the bottom with Carolina and Maryland also with only three wins. The lower half of the playoff spots are up for grabs making every game extremely important.
You’ll be able to catch all the games on ESPN+ this weekend with both the first game on Saturday and the first game on Sunday also being telecast on ABC.
We were also lucky enough to obtain credentials and will be at the games in Denver for Week 9 so watch for our photo galleries.
Di Miller, PLL Correspondent & Photographer
Lacrosse is Awesome©