The Big East opener is coming up this weekend for Marquette women’s lacrosse, and with that in mind, we should probably see what everyone has been up to since the start of February, huh? Before we get a look at the league, let’s stop off and fit in the specific details of Saturday’s conference opener.
Big East Game #1: vs Georgetown Hoyas (5-3, 0-1 Big East)
Date: Saturday, March 21, 2026 Time: 11am Central Location: Andy Glockner Memorial Bubble, Valley Fields, Milwaukee, Wisconsin Streaming: ESPN+ Live Stats: Stat Broadcast Bluesky Updates: @AnonymousEagle
Marquette is 4-11 all time against Georgetown. The two sides met during Marquette’s very first season as a program back in 2013, which means that one goes in the books as their only non-conference game ever since MU was an independent in Year 1. The Hoyas won the first six meetings before the Golden Eagles broke though with a 14-12 win over #14 GU in 2018. Things alternated for a while, but Georgetown won the meetings in each of the past two seasons, including 14-13 in D.C. last year.
With that out of the way, let’s move along to a whip-around of the entire Big East. We’ll sort them in order of their RPI ranking through games played on March 18, since the NCAA debuted the 2026 RPIs on Monday. There’s an info dump with record, RPI, Inside Lacrosse/KANE media poll ranking where applicable, various stats leaders, and then the best win/worst loss according to the RPI. We’ll wrap up each section with whatever strikes my particular fancy about each team as I’m taking a look at how their spring has been going. One last note: Remember that there are just 133 Division 1 women’s lacrosse teams. That means the split line in between the top half and bottom half of the country is right at 66 and 67. If you are ranked, say, #68 in the RPI like one particular Big East squad, you’re just over onto the bottom half of the country.
Okay, here we go!
Villanova Wildcats
Record: 5-3
RPI: #20
Points Leader: Rose Christie, 23
Goals Leader: Mary Moore, 16
Assists Leader: Sophia Corretjer, 13
Goalie: Makenzie Fisher; 10.45 GAA, .374 SV%
Best Win: vs #41 Towson, 15-6
Worst Loss: vs #13 Rutgers, 15-12
Three top 13 losses isn’t too bad, as Villanova comes into Big East play after suffering an 18-10 loss to #12 ranked and RPI #5 Stony Brook on Tuesday. That one was kind of tilted on the Wildcats early, as they went down 9-2 with five minutes left in the first half. That game broke up a three game winning streak by VU, with all three wins coming on the road before the Seawolves caught them back in the Philly suburbs.
Villanova has perhaps the most interesting arrangement of top scorers in the conference because they’re not leaning on any one particular woman. Mary Moore has the most goals, Sophia Corretjer has the most assists, but neither woman is using that team lead to get to the team lead in points. Heck, Moore and Corretjer aren’t even #2 behind Rose Christie in total points, as that spot is held up by Elena Torres. This list is prone to shifting on a game by game basis, as Christie has 23 points and Corretjer has 19. That sounds awful, and by the way: None of these women are seniors.
Denver Pioneers
Record: 7-1
RPI: #23
Inside Lacrosse Poll: #19
Points Leader: Olivia Ripple, 40 (#1 PPG)
Goals Leader: Olivia Ripple, 32 (#1 GPG)
Assists Leader: Ryan Dineen, 13
Goalie: Lexi Gwaku; 7.81 GAA, .457 SV% (#1 GAA)
Best Win: at #22 USC, 15-4
Only Loss: at #5 Stony Brook, 12-11 (OT)
Yes, Villanova is ahead of Denver and Georgetown in the RPI even though the Pios and the Hoyas are in the IL national rankings. That’s because they’re making use of a clever trick: Don’t play sub-100 opponents. Heck, VU’s not playing anyone sub-85, and so they benefit from that angle while Denver has “padded” their situation with wins over #101 High Point and #105 Stetson.
With that said, please note that Denver is causing massive problems for everyone on both ends of the field. Olivia Ripple is the top scorer in the conference and on the back end, Lexi Gwaku backstops the most stingy defense in the entire conference. Oh, and in case that wasn’t scary enough, please note that Caroline Kiel is second in the league in goals per game behind Ripple. Marquette’s Tess Osburn is the only other player in the league that’s averaging a hat trick or better this year other than those two, and the Pios have both of them. This could end up being an interesting path to the Big East regular season title as Denver’s games against Villanova and Georgetown are two of their last three contests.
Georgetown Hoyas
Record: 5-3
RPI: #31
Inside Lacrosse Poll: #23
Points Leader: Anne McGovern, 30
Goals Leader: Anne McGovern, 20
Assists Leader: Lauren Steer, 13
Goalie: Leah Warehime; 8.14 GAA, .479 SV%
Best Win: at #7 Johns Hopkins, 12-6
Worst Loss: vs #32 Penn at a neutral site in Maryland, 11-10
The Hoyas come into Saturday after three straight one goal games, which includes losses to Loyola Maryland and Penn and a win over Delaware. The Loyola loss involved scoring three in a row in the fourth quarter to tie the game at eight before giving up the winner with 4:33 to go, while the Penn game saw Georgetown going into the fourth quarter up 10-8 and then getting outscored 3-0 in the final frame and losing on a goal with over four minutes left. The Delaware game was drama-tastic, as the largest lead of the game was 2-0 Delaware in the first and it was either one goal in either direction or tied for the entire rest of the game. Georgetown gave up an equalizer with 2:03 left before getting a winner from Molly Byrne with less than 30 seconds left to go.
It’s not like Georgetown’s exactly being shy about offense, either. They’re firing off more than 26 shots per game but ending up with just 10.6 goals per game. For a comparison, Marquette’s getting 14.6 goals on “only” 28.5 shots per game. The shots aren’t that different, just the results are. Part of that might just be a strength of schedule situation, as the Hoyas have only played one sub-60 team so far this season. However, that also means that Georgetown’s defense — look at that 8.14 for Leah Warehime! — is probably pretty legitimate and might be problems for the Golden Eagles on Saturday.
Connecticut Huskies
Record: 3-5
RPI: #34
Points Leader: Megan O’Brien, 28
Goals Leader: Megan O’Brien, 16
Assists Leader: Megan O’Brien, 12
Goalie: Sofia Oximana; 11.42 GAA, .423 SV%
Best Win: at #33 UMass, 12-8
Worst Loss: at #77 Drexel, 12-11 (2 OT)
UConn’s RPI is starting to skyrocket, as they debuted at #25 and their 11-5 loss to Colorado on Wednesday — that’s a top 15 Buffaloes team! — jumped them up to #34. I don’t know the details of how the RPI is calculated, but with two losses in four days — they also lost 17-5 at Yale back on Saturday — it would seem that as the Huskies add losses to their arrangement, the loss to Drexel starts dragging them down harder.
It’s worth nothing that the loss at Drexel happened after UConn scored four straight to tie the game at 10 with three minutes left in the fourth quarter, had a more than 15 minute shutout streak busted up with less than two minutes to go, then scored the game-tying goal with 26 seconds left. On some level, as Drexel loses five of their six most recent games, barely getting that game to overtime before losing in the second extra session in the season opener becomes more and more of a sign of what the Huskies are this season.
One thing to watch for UConn as the season goes along here is the output of Rayea Davis. She was second in the Big East in points per game when everyone’s season was over last year and thus my pick for preseason Offensive Player of the Year, but as you can see, she’s not leading the Huskies in any of the three scoring categories. She is second in goals at 13 and thus second in points at 18, but she’s leading the team in shots with eight more than Megan O’Brien. If Davis can get on track, that’s going to solve a lot of things for UConn.
Marquette Golden Eagles
Record: 5-3
RPI: #68
Points Leader: Dani Serrano, 37
Goals Leader: Tess Osburn, 24
Assists Leader: Dani Serrano, 18 (#1 APG)
Goalie: Jillian Howell; 12.63 GAA, .434 SV%
Best Win: vs #60 Eastern Michigan, 20-9
Worst Loss: at #42 Arizona State, 19-16
I’m pretty sure that Dani Serrano is the runaway favorite for Big East Freshman of the Year right now. She has two of the weekly awards already, and if she keeps up her team lead in points here (Tess Osburn has 30), it’s going to be hard to argue that someone else deserves the spot over her. It would probably be helpful if Marquette finds a way to insert themselves into the Big East tournament in order to pay off Serrano’s playmaking, but if she wins the assists title, maybe it doesn’t matter anyway.
Xavier Musketers
Record: 2-7
RPI: #119
Points Leader: Megan Droney & Maya Graham, 18
Goals Leader: Samantha Balara, 12
Assists Leader: Megan Droney, 11
Goalie: Jada Brandon; 8.94 GAA, .496 SV% (#1 SV%)
Best Win: vs #126 Detroit Mercy, 16-2
Worst Loss: at #110 Old Dominion, 5-4
This is Year #4 of the Musketeers program, but the first under head coach Brittney Morris. I’m not saying that’s why they’re having trouble this year after going 2-13 last year with one Big East win, but this is definitely not a fun time for them either.
Xavier is doing pretty well in terms of shots for and against relative to what their record is. I mention this because it’s not like Jada Brandon is getting pelted with shots to post that best-in-the-Big-East save percentage. Heck, Xavier’s actually better at putting their shots on frame than their opponents are. I don’t know if she can keep this up as Big East play is going to result in XU’s four toughest games of the season in terms of the RPI ranking and the Musketeers are coming off Brandon giving up eight goals on 11 shots on frame before getting pulled against Vanderbilt. The Commodores are Xavier’s current toughest opponent at #38 in the RPI, so we’ll see how things go from here.
Butler Bulldogs
Record: 3-6
RPI: #129
Points Leader: Riley Ryan, 28
Goals Leader: Elise Latham, 25
Assists Leader: Riley Ryan, 13
Goalie: Samantha Wilson; 12.47 GAA, .395 SV%
Best Win: vs #124 Duquesne, 16-11
Worst Loss: at #123 Radford, 15-11
This is Year 10 for Butler. They are coming off a winless 2025 campaign and a 2-14 year before that. Thus, the good news is that this year, which is the fourth for Maggie Zentgraf as head coach, is already better than the last two combined. The bad news is that the loss to Radford is their most recent game. It’s not their last one before Big East play starts as they have a neutral site game against Wofford this weekend, but it’s still a bad way to be as you’re on the edge of league action.
That Radford game was also not as close as the score makes it look. Butler was up 10-7 with three minutes left in the third quarter, and then Radford scored eight unanswered in the fourth quarter before BU’s Elle Tomalia threw one in in the final minute for that four goal margin. It could have been a lot worse, it seems.
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