The following is an excerpt from the Mitten State Lax Newsletter. You can check out previous newsletters and subscribe here: LINK
Although I haven’t seen it mentioned anywhere else yet, I noticed that Concordia-Ann Arbor’s women’s lacrosse program has ended one year early. In June of last year Concordia-Ann Arbor announced that it would be discontinuing all athletic programs after the 2024-25 academic year due to the university’s financial struggles. Earlier this year I had noticed that the Concordia women’s schedule hadn’t been updated for this spring at a time when the schedules for other peer schools had. Although the team did appear on the schedules of some of their Mitten State opponents, those games have now been removed or marked cancelled. Perhaps the team was unable to maintain a large enough roster to compete this season once it was announced to be its last.
The men’s program at Concordia is competing for one final season (currently with 2 wins and 3 losses and ranked #10 in the NAIA) with a roster of 23 (17 fewer than last season). Coach Ty McGuire is finishing off a successful run of 7 seasons with the Cardinals and is also taking the head coaching position at Saline High School this spring. Among NAIA programs on the men’s side, Madonna, Aquinas, Lawrence Tech, and Concordia are all ranked in the top-ten and Siena Heights is receiving votes.
Checking in on the other NAIA women’s programs in the Mitten State:
Aquinas has only 4 games on the schedule this spring and is now being lead by Interim Coach Kyle Goodbee (“Manager of Student-Athlete Well-Being“ at Aquinas). The school announced in mid-January that Coach Chip Vasquez would no longer be at the helm after leading the program to a 2-12 record in his only season there.
Rochester Christian is in their sixth season (counting their one-game COVID season) and has yet to pick up their first win as a program. With only 13 players on their roster last spring, their website has not yet been updated with a roster for this year (though it does list an eight-game schedule).
Madonna and Siena Heights have normal schedules published. So far Madonna has no wins and two losses, and Siena Heights got their first win of the season last Sunday after starting with three losses.
A bright spot is perennial powerhouse Lawrence Tech which started the season with two close losses against NAIA #1 SCAD and #7 (now #3) Keiser in games that were played at USA Lacrosse Headquarters in Baltimore, MD. They’ve since bounced back with wins over Georgetown (KY) and Kalamazoo. LTU has dropped from second to fourth in the NAIA rankings in the second poll of the season.