Hopkins Blue Jays, DU Pioneers Open Season at Homewood on 2/3/24

Johns Hopkins-Denver Men’s Lacrosse Notes 2/1/24

The Game
•  Johns Hopkins opens the 2024 season as the Blue Jays welcome Denver to Homewood Field for the first meeting between the two teams in 13  years.  Faceoff is set for 12:03 pm on Saturday, February 3.

When Last We Saw Them
•  Johns Hopkins posted a 12-6 record, grabbed a share of the Big Ten regular season title and advanced to the NCAA Quarterfinals last season.
• Denver finished the 2023 season with a 10-5 record.  The Pioneers advanced to the BIG EAST title game before falling to Georgetown.

The Facts
•  This is the 137th season of Johns Hopkins men’s lacrosse.  JHU first fielded a team in 1883.
•  Johns Hopkins enters this week’s game with an all-time record of 1,016-370-15 (.731).
• Johns Hopkins is the only men’s lacrosse program in the nation with 1,000 or more all-time victories.  The Blue Jays picked up the program’s 1,000th victory with an 11-10 win over Loyola on February 19, 2022.
•  JHU owns 44 national championships with nine NCAA titles, 29 USILA titles and six ILA crowns to its credit.

Oh Captain, My Captain
•  Two individuals were selected to serve as Blue Jay captains during the 2024 season.
• Graduate students Garrett Degnon (A) and Beaudan Szuluk (D) will lead the team this season after a vote of their teammates.
• This is the second season that Degnon and Szuluk have served as captains; they shared the role with Jack Hawley during the 2023 season.

Poll Position
]• Johns Hopkins has several preseason national rankings as the Jays check in at number five in the Inside Lacrosse Media Poll and number six in the USA Lacrosse Poll.  The USILA also produced a preseason poll with the Blue Jays ranked sixth in that poll.
• Denver checked in at #13 in the Inside Lacrosse Poll, 11th in the USA Lacrosse Poll and 15th in the USILA Poll.

Series History
• This week’s game will be just the third between Johns Hopkins and Denver and the first since 2011.  The teams split their first two meetings in 1998 and 2011.
• A detailed look at the series history can be found on page five.

Blue Jays First in B1G Preseason Poll
•  Johns Hopkins was picked to finish first in the 2024 Big Ten Preseason Poll of the league’s head coaches.  The Blue Jays earned a share of the 2023 B1G regular season title with Penn State).
•  Since the formation of the Big Ten in 2015, Johns Hopkins has won the Big Ten Tournament title twice (2015, 2018) and advanced to the title game two other times (2019, 2021).
• Johns Hopkins’ two Big Ten titles rank second in league history and the four appearances in the league championship game are also second in league history.

2024 B1G Preseason Poll
1 – Johns Hopkins
2 – Penn State
3 – Maryland
4 – Michigan
5 – Ohio State
6 – Rutgers

For Openers
•  The Blue Jays are 19-4 in their last 23 season openers.
•  Johns Hopkins has won 14 of its last 16 season openers and is 2-1 in openers under head coach Peter Milliman.
•  Johns Hopkins has scored at least 10 goals in its season opener in 14 of the last 16 years and at least 12 goals in eight of the last 12.

That’s Early
•  This week’s game against Denver on February 3 will be the earliest, by game date, in Johns Hopkins men’s lacrosse history.
• Prior to this season, the earliest game in program history came in 2023, when the Blue Jays hosted Jacksonville on February 4.

In February
• This week’s game against Denver will be the 57th all-time for Johns Hopkins in the month of February.
•  JHU is 36-20 (.643) all-time in games played in the month of February.
•  Johns Hopkins played its first game in the month of February in 1998, didn’t play again in February until 2004 and has now played at least one game in the opening month of the season every year since 2006.

An Experienced Group
•  Johns Hopkins played 18 games in 2023.  With 10 players listed as starters for each game, that’s 180 combined starts.
• Players who combined to start 137 games are back for the Blue Jays this season – meaning JHU returns 76.1% of its starts from last season.  In all, 14 different players who started at least one game in 2023 have returned in 2024.

A Productive Group Returns
•  Johns Hopkins scored 226 goals and rang up 134 assists for 360 points in 2023 and a majority of that production returns in 2024.
• Players who combined for 214 of the Blue Jays’ 226 goals last season are back in 2024.
• Players who combined for 125 of the Blue Jays’ 134 assists last season return.
• In all, players who totaled 339 of Hopkins’ 360 points last season are back this season.

More Production Notes
•  Johns Hopkins returns nine of its top 10 goal scorers from last season.  In fact, the only player who scored more than two goals in 2023 who is not back this season is Ian Krampf (7).
• The Blue Jays return players who ranked first through 10th on the team in assists last season.  Every player who had more than two assists for the Blue Jays a year ago is back this season.
• JHU returns 11 of its top 12 and 14 of its top 15 point producers from last season.  Among the 15 players who posted five or more points in 2023, only Ian Krampf (9) is not back in 2024.

30 Straight For Degnon
•  Graduate student attackman Garrett Degnon will carry a 30-game goal-scoring streak into the 2024 season after he scored at least one goal in all 17 games he played in last season.  The streak is currently the longest active streak in the nation.
• During his 30-game goal-scoring run, Degnon has scored 76 goals and has 24 multi-goal games and 12 games with 3+ goals to his credit.
• Degnon’s 30-game run is also the longest by a Johns Hopkins player since a JHU-record-tying 37-game run by Ryan Brown from 2013-16.  Brown and Terry Riordan (1992-95) co-hold the JHU record for most consecutive games having scored a goal.

Non-Offensive Scoring
• In 18 games last season, Johns Hopkins got 35 points (21g, 14a) from non-offensive players, an average of 1.94 points per game.
• Scanning the 2024 roster, we find that returning non-offensive players rang up 15 goals and six assists for 21 points last season.
• Highlighting the effort last season for the non-offensive players were six-point games against Virginia and Bryant (NCAA Tournament) and a five-point effort against Rutgers.

Causing Trouble
• Johns Hopkins twice caused 11 turnovers in a game last season and twice caused 10 as well.  In all, the Blue Jays had 135 CTs on the year for an average of 7.5 per game.
• The 135 CTs the Blue Jays amassed this season are a JHU single-season record, while the 7.50 CTs/game narrowly missed the school-record of 7.63 (2022).  Caused turnovers were first kept as an official statistic in 2009.
• Leading the way in the CT category last season were Scott Smith, who counted 23 CTs to his credit in 18 games.  Alex Mazzone (18), Beaudan Szuluk (18), Brett Martin (15), and Carson Brown (14) all had at least 14 CTs on the year as well; of the five players who totaled 14+ CTs during the 2023 season for Johns Hopkins, only Mazzone is not back this season.

Offensive Notes of Interest
• Since the start of the 2022 season, the Blue Jays are 18-3 when they score 11 or more goals.
• In 72 quarters last season, the Blue Jays scored two or more goals in 56 quarters and four or more in 31 quarters.
• Johns Hopkins averaged 12.56 goals per game in 2023.  That output was the highest scoring average for the Blue Jays since 2015, when Hopkins averaged 13.0 goals per game.  The 12.56 goals per game are also the second-best mark at JHU since 2004.
• As a team, Johns Hopkins shot 32.9% in 2023, a mark that ranked 14th in the nation.  The 32.9% shooting percentage was the highest for JHU since 2015 (.331).

Closing Strong
• Johns Hopkins outscored the opposition 120-91 in the second half last season and the Jays were especially strong at closing out games.
• During the last 11 games of the 2023 season, the Blue Jays went 8-3 and outscored those 11 opponents by a combined score of 29-11 in the final 10 minutes of the fourth quarter.
• In the last 11 games of the 2023 season, Johns Hopkins allowed more than one goal in the final 10 minutes of the game just once (Bryant-2).

Defensive Notes of Interest
• The Johns Hopkins defense held 15 of 18 opponents under its season scoring average last season.  The Blue Jays have held eight teams at least three goals under their final scoring average.
• In addition, the Blue Jays held their 18 opponents scoreless for a period of at least 10 minutes 24 different times last season – 15 of those came in the last 10 games.
• Johns Hopkins is 16-0 under head coach Peter Milliman and defensive coordinator Jamison Koesterer when holding the opposition to 10 goals or less.

Additional Notes in PDF Version Above