This much we know: Princeton is good. So is Syracuse.

Another season of collegiate lacrosse, another season with the same names at the top of the preseason polls. The Tigers have won six of the last 10 national championships, including last season’s, and are the preseason No. 1. The Orangemen have made 19 consecutive Final Fours, picked up seven championships during that stretch and clock in at No. 2 to start the season.

(Snooze.)

OK, OK.

(We want drama! Intrigue! Something other than the Ivy Leaguers in New Jersey and kids wearing — ugh — orange-colored unis.)

Just so we covered all the bases, we talked with six Top 25 coaches to get their take on the upcoming season. Between praising all the other top teams and downplaying their own — braggarts are few and far between in lacrosse — the coaches told us who is hands-down the best attackman in the country, who they really don’t want to play and why the snoozing might instead happen during the game.

(That’s more like it.)

Best Attackman — Mike Powell, Syracuse

A gimme. All six coaches agreed on Powell, who won Attackman of the Year as a freshman after he scored 30 goals and assisted on 40 more. SU expects plenty more out of him with Liam Banks sidelined because of academic problems.

‘He’s spectacular,’ Notre Dame coach Kevin Corrigan said. ‘There’s just nothing he doesn’t do well. The goal he scored to tie that game in the championship — everybody knew who was going to have the ball. They had great team defense for him and he still finds a way to finish it off. He’s just something.

‘We scrimmaged them this fall. Our guy (Irish captain A.J. Wright) did a great job on him. And he scored four goals. Next thing you know, your guy had a great day on him and he’s four and two.’

Best Defenseman — John Glatzel, Syracuse

Much closer than the attackman vote. Glatzel had two no-doubters and a couple split votes.

‘He’s talented, he can cover anyone, he’s been successful, he has a great stick,’ Princeton head coach Bill Tierney said. ‘He’s a great kid.’

Others demurred and went with Georgetown junior Kyle Sweeney or Maryland sophomore Chris Passavia.

‘He’s great,’ Maryland coach Dave Cottle said of Passavia. ‘He’s the best athlete on the team. He’s a gorilla. He’s 5 feet 10 inches, but he’s wide and he’s strong and he’s quick and fast.’

Best Goalie — ?

This was like asking the coaches who they like better: ‘N Sync or the Backstreet Boys? It’s the worse of two evils.

No one can answer this question because no one really knows. First-team All-Americans Trevor Tierney (Princeton) and Pat McGinnis (Maryland) graduated. So did Notre Dame’s second-team All-American, Kirk Howell, and SU’s third-teamer, Rob Mulligan.

‘We all have voids we have to fill,’ said Johns Hopkins coach Dave Pietramala, who returns junior Rob Scherr.

Virginia, with preseason All-American Tillman Johnson, is the only other top-six team that returns its goalie. He and Cornell’s Justin Cynar are the best returnees, and Cottle said his goalie, junior Danny McCormick, could be as good as McGinnis.

No One Wants to Play — Towson

The Tigers, who played geriatric-slow lacrosse before coach Tony Seaman took over, now possess one of the most potent attacks in the country.

Tierney fears little lefty Brad Reppert and his 35 goals and 35 assists from last season. Even a greater worry, he said, is Kyle Campbell, a 53-goal scorer. And if defensemen lock down on those two, Ryan Obloj is more than willing to pick up the slack.

‘Towson is a very talented team, and they bring everybody back,’ Pietramala said. ‘They snuck up on some people last year.”

Trends of the Year — Slowed-down, mixed-up offenses

‘I don’t know there’s any individual defenseman right now who makes me go ooh and ahh,’ Corrigan said, ‘but there are so many good team defenses. It’s very damn difficult to score goals these days.’

And the result, some coaches said, will be tempered offenses. Even the Orangemen could take it easier this season, a far cry from the run-and-gun-and-run-some-more attacks that wore down defenses in the early and mid-90s.

‘I’m seeing a little bit more ball-control offense from teams, including Syracuse,’ UMass coach Greg Cannella said. ‘They controlled the team more than they had to in the past.

‘You look at the top teams and what they have defensively not only in personnel but different defensive packages. Teams are trying to figure out what they do. And when you try and figure out another defense, you set your offensive players up in certain patterns to see what the defense is doing and adjust accordingly.’

Tierney expects a few teams to try inverting their offense. That positions a midfielder behind the cage, usually a spot reserved for attackmen who instead stay in front of the goal, giving them room to dodge. If the offense turns the ball over, the short-stick defensemen are stuck behind the cage, forcing an unfavorable transition led by the long poles.

Scoop of the Week

Jay Pfeifer, despite giving up five goals and making only one save against Navy in Saturday’s 17-9 scrimmage victory, will start in goal for Syracuse in this Saturday’s scrimmage at Maryland.

‘Jay was put in a tough spot early in the game,’ SU head coach John Desko said. ‘A lot of those goals Navy worked so hard for come off the crease. It’s very difficult to make those saves from two, three, four, five yards. He made some good saves and showed some good composure.

‘We made a decision to go with Jay in the Navy scrimmage, and we told him we weren’t going to give up on him.’

Mr. Cleo?

‘Remember this,’ Cottle said. ‘Last year, I said it was Princeton. This year, I’m saying it’s Syracuse.’

Cottle was adamant about how good the Orangemen are, dismissing the claims that Pfeifer is young and SU’s face-off unit could suffer without All-American Chris Cercy.

‘Syracuse is obviously the team that might be light years ahead of the country offensively,’ he said.

Numbers lie … but these don’t

1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 8

The rankings of teams on Johns Hopkins’ schedule this year. The Blue Jays hold the No. 3 spot in the preseason coaches poll. And they don’t play seventh-ranked Georgetown in their 12-game schedule. Wusses.

What’s up with …

Penn State scheduling Top 25 teams for its last 10 games? Talk about a gauntlet: start with Georgetown, end with Virginia and sandwich the likes of Cornell, UMass and Navy in between.

Not even Blair Thomas could save these guys.

Truly Useless Note of the Week

Tierney keeps a copy of ‘Lacrosse: Technique and Tradition,’ penned by legendary Johns Hopkins coach Bob Scott, in his office. The book sells on Amazon.com for as little as $4.55. Or you could go to Powells.com — that’s Powell’s City of Books in Portland, Ore., not the official site of Casey, Ryan and Mike — and buy it for $9.95.

We bid adieu …

With some insight from Tierney, whom no one will ever confuse with Giorgio Armani:

‘Things are very different now in this day of patient lacrosse. Lacrosse is very simple. It’s like fashion. If it’s not vogue today, just hang around because it will be next year. None of us are bright enough to invent things ourselves.’

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Published on February 11, 2002 at 12:00 pm