Syracuse men’s lacrosse: ACC Tournament Semifinals vs. Notre Dame preview and game thread

The Orange haven’t won since their game against…Notre Dame.

With their April losing streak reaching three, the Syracuse Orange will be very happy to see the calendar change to May as they head down to Charlotte to take on the last team they beat, the Notre Dame Fighting Irish, in the semifinals of the ACC Tournament.

‘Cuse is sitting right on the edge of the NCAA Tournament, in need of a complete lack of bid stealers (Yale, non-Richmond A10, non-Army Patriot) in order to have a chance.

A second win over Notre Dame would go along way in securing their bid themselves, but it’s going to take a heck of a lot better effort than we’ve seen from them the past three weeks.

The Orange and Irish are set for their rematch at 5 PM on the ACC Network.

• All-time series: 23rd meeting; Series tied, 11-11
• Last meeting: Syracuse W, 14-9, on April 5, 2025
• Syracuse this season: 9-5 overall, 2-2 ACC
• Notre Dame this season: 8-3 overall, 3-1 ACC

This is a very difficult rematch to get a feel for, mostly because of the extremes of the first matchup. In that game, we saw some things that we have rarely, if ever, seen during the Gary Gait coaching era.

There was ‘Cuse physicality that led to a near 40-minute Irish scoreless drought. Joey Spallina going off-ball and moving around to elude ACC Co-Defensive Player of the Year Shawn Lyght to the tune of four goals, 64 percent SU domination on face-offs and nine failed clears by the Orange.

That’s a lot of extreme aspects of that game that will be difficult to replicate a second time around, which means the ‘Cuse offense can’t count of their defense holding ND down so long to help give them some cushion on the score board. Watching Spallina v. Lyght is going to be fascinating after the way it went down the first time, if they’re even matched up again.

On the other end of things, can the Orange possibly manage to not turn it over nearly double-digit times on clear attempts alone? They also had a disaster in the clear game last weekend against UNC, something they’ll need to clean up against an aggressive ND team.

How about the intangibles of a ND team that wants revenge vs. a ‘Cuse team that needs to get a win to add to their resume and end their month-long winless streak? Intangibles often lack for this Orange team, but they’ll need to find them in order to top the Irish for the second time this season.