Lacrosse in the Big Ten wasn’t possible.

At least not in the mind of John Paul, head coach of Michigan’s then-club men’s lacrosse team.

But in 2012, when he became the head coach of a Michigan team that was the first notable football school to add men’s lacrosse as a varsity sport in 31 years, it helped make it a possibility.

At a small recruiting dinner the next winter, then-UM Director of Athletics Dave Brandon pulled Paul aside and asked him what he thought about adding Johns Hopkins to the Big Ten.

“Of course my reaction was one, shock, and two, ‘Yeah, let’s do it,’” Paul said.

Michigan, along with Maryland, Rutgers, Penn State and Ohio State, are five of the lacrosse programs in the Big Ten, which is midway through its first year as a Division I lacrosse conference. Johns Hopkins’ men team, which fell to SU on Saturday, is the sixth Big Ten participant and the Northwestern women’s team — a national powerhouse and SU’s opponent this upcoming Sunday — rounds out the women’s contingent in the Big Ten.

Joining the ACC as the only power-five conferences to sponsor lacrosse, the Big Ten’s addition of lacrosse also increases exposure and the presence of lacrosse into the Midwest.

“To have another major conference have the sport only helps,” Syracuse head coach John Desko said. “I think it’ll help the sport grow and help the quality of teams in that conference grow, which will help Division I lacrosse all across the country.”

Although the birth of the Big Ten is a step in development in college lacrosse, Maryland’s move to the conference leaves the ACC shorthanded with just five men’s lacrosse teams.

Instead of an ACC tournament consolation game between the fifth- and sixth-place teams, the ACC’s No. 5 seed will face the Ivy League’s Pennsylvania — an opponent that is currently unranked. Last year, two Top 10 ACC teams squared off in the tournament showcase game.

With less than six teams, the ACC will lose its automatic qualifier for the NCAA tournament starting in the 2017 season. To get that automatic bid back, the conference will either have to reach out to an outside school to join in lacrosse, or have a school already in the conference add lacrosse as a varsity sport.

“You hope somebody adds it, but I’m not sure that’s going to happen,” North Carolina head coach Joe Breschi said.

Meanwhile, the Big Ten instead has the six teams required for an automatic qualifier to the NCAA tournament in both men’s and women’s lacrosse.

Rutgers and Maryland joining the Big Ten wasn’t fueled by lacrosse, but for Johns Hopkins, whose only Division I sport is lacrosse, the move was.

Since 1883, the Blue Jays had been independent, playing without a conference and without a chance at an automatic bid to the NCAA tournament. But when the team missed out on the NCAA tournament in 2013 for the first time in 42 years, JHU reconsidered its situation as the sport began to expand.

“We were concerned with where we would be … if we were an independent,” Johns Hopkins head coach Dave Pietramala said. “We had no idea, no safety net, no guarantees — nothing.”

So Johns Hopkins latched onto the Big Ten, giving it what Pietramala calls, “a second bite of the apple.” Johns Hopkins can make the tournament with an at-large bid or by winning the Big Ten.

The conference, with the Big Ten Network, will increase the exposure for all the teams in the conference by broadcasting into more than 60 million homes.

The increased exposure has turned into a recruiting tool for many of the teams. Recruits recognize the chance to play on TV more and have acknowledged the prestige of some of the teams in the Big Ten, Paul said.

“It creates more of a foothold in the Midwest, which is important,” Paul said. “It gives it credibility and more attention in the Midwest … People pay attention to it when it says Big Ten out here.”

Though the Big Ten is expanding lacrosse into the Midwest, its conference tournaments are mostly being held in the East to start.

The men’s tournament will be at Maryland and Johns Hopkins for the next two years, respectively. The women’s tournament will be held in Rutgers, Northwestern, Michigan and Maryland for the next four.

As viewership increases, the Big Ten will consider more locations in the Midwest in the future, said Brad Traviolia, Big Ten chief financial officer and chief operating officer.

At the end of the month, the Big Ten will begin conference play in lacrosse for the first time, showcasing its new teams on a new network for college lacrosse.

Lacrosse is expanding, Paul said, and the Big Ten is just the first step.

“I never would’ve imagined even a few years ago that we would have Big Ten lacrosse at this point,” Paul said. “I think it’s pretty exciting for the sport.”

Published on March 18, 2015 at 12:43 am

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