LEXINGTON, Va. – The Old Dominion Athletic Conference recently announced the seedings for the 2025 Men's Lacrosse Championship, and Washington and Lee earned the top seed for the second straight season.
The No. 9 nationally-ranked Generals completed the regular season with an overall record of 14-3 and an ODAC record of 10-0 to claim the league's No. 1 seed. The Lynchburg Hornets came in as the conference's No. 2 seed, with Roanoke and Hampden-Sydney rounding out the top four. Randolph-Macon is the No. 5 seed this year, with Shenandoah, Virginia Wesleyan and Guilford completing the eight-team field.
With an extra team in the field this year compared to last season, first round play was completed on Sunday, April 26, with RMC and Shenandoah getting past Guilford and VWU, respectively. The Yellow Jackets then traveled to No. 4 seed Hampden-Sydney on Tuesday and pulled out an 11-9 win over the Tigers to advance to the semifinals, while Roanoke cruised past Shenandoah, 24-10.
As the top two seeds, the Generals will now get RMC in Thursday's semifinal, with Roanoke traveling to Lynchburg. The two winning teams from Thursday's semifinals will then contend for the ODAC championship on Saturday, with the highest remaining seed serving as the site host.
The Generals' semifinal matchup against Randolph-Macon is sure to be a fiery contest, as the Yellow Jackets pulled off an upset win over the Generals at Wilson Field in last season's ODAC semifinal round. The two teams then met again in Lexington during the 2025 regular season, where the Generals were the victors, 12-11, in overtime on April 5. In fact, each of the past three meetings have each been decided by two goals or fewer.
Should the Generals advance to Saturday's conference championship bout, they would take on either Lynchburg or Roanoke, both of whom fell against the Generals in the regular season by a goal each. W&L topped Lynchburg, 14-13, in overtime on April 9, their next game after the RMC overtime win, before downing Roanoke, 13-12, in Salem on April 23.
Offensively, W&L is led into the ODAC Tournament by senior
Hillis Burns and junior
James Haley, who have combined for 118 points on 74 goals and 44 assists this season. Burns leads the team in both assists (27) and points (63), while Haley is the team leader in goals (38). A well-balanced attack, the Generals boast 11 different players with double-digit goal totals and seven players with at least 10 assists.
Face-offs have been a huge strength for the Generals this season, as their face-off unit ranks second in Division III in winning percentage at 0.764. Sophomore
Tyler Spano paces the face-off specialists with 238 wins on 324 attempts (.735) with 159 ground balls, to go along with seven points on three goals and four assists. Spano has taken over 65 percent of the team's face-offs this season, with the remaining 35 percent being covered by sophomore
Thomas Moxley and first-years
Jax Lou and
Israel Mikkelson. Moxley owns a 0.803 winning percentage (57-71), Lou is 47-of-53 (.887) and Mikkelson is 36-of-47 (.766) for a win rate of 0.819 (140-171) between those three players.
Juniors
Chris Datz and
Jay O'Keefe have shined on the defensive unit this season, each starting all 17 games for the Blue and White thus far. O'Keefe leads the team with 23 caused turnovers, plus 33 ground balls, while Datz has caused 19 turnovers and gotten to 45 ground balls. First-year
Gabe Reiter has also impressed during his rookie season, ranking second to Spano in ground balls (48) to go along with 11 caused turnovers.
In goal, sophomore
Nick De Cain has seen the most action this season with 12 starts and 16 games played, covering 662:16 for the Generals. In that time, De Cain is yielding a 10.15 goals-against average and a 0.511 save percentage with an 11-2 record. First-year
JJ Kim has filled in for the other five starts of the season, playing 255:17 total with a 0.448 save percentage and an 8.70 GAA.
The Yellow Jackets and Generals will face-off on Thursday at 4:00 p.m. at Wilson Field.
Live stats and a
live stream will be available. Tickets will be sold on-site through HomeTown Ticketing, but fans are encouraged to purchase tickets ahead of time
here.
Nestled in the mountains of Virginia, Washington and Lee University is a proud member of NCAA Division III and the Old Dominion Athletic Conference. Founded in 1749, W&L is the ninth-oldest college in the United States and a top-ranked liberal arts university. With over 500 student-athletes in 24 varsity sports, the Generals have celebrated over 265 conference championships. Learn more about the Blue and White by visiting www.generalssports.com or on social media at @WLUGenerals.
