The careers of the Syracuse senior class of 2026 came to an end on Saturday in the loss to Notre Dame in the Final Four, bringing to a close one of the most scrutinized and complicated legacies in the history of Syracuse lacrosse.
That class, headlined and represented by their leader, Joey Spallina, are the group that have defined the first half decade of the Gary Gait coaching era.
This was the class that had everything thrust upon them before they even arrived on campus. The No. 1 recruiting class in the nation,
the No. 1 player in the class leading 10 players ranked in the Top 100 who were tasked with turning the program around from their lowest point in 47 years. The expectation was that the program would reload and right the ship quickly.
For their part, as a group, they never shied away from any of it. They talked openly about wanting to bring Syracuse back to glory, even specifically talking about winning a national championship across multiple seasons.
But returning to the glory days is a completely different proposition under the modern landscape of college lacrosse. No longer is the nation’s high and prep school talent concentrated in a few specific areas at the college level. The game has grown to all corners of the country, and with it, the distribution of talent has dispersed around an ever-growing Division I landscape.
‘Cuse opponents used to make reference to the idea of the “Dome Gods”, the concept that beating the Orange inside the Dome required beating not just the team themselves, but also the mythical gods that were helping create their incredible home field advantage.
Those gods seemed to be back in place this year for an 8-0 home record, but these days it seems like they’re not the only ethereal occupants of the Dome. And that’s because SU in the here and now is constantly battling the ghosts of Syracuse lacrosse past, the banners of whom hang in the rafters and serve as a reminder of what used to be.
The Orange are far off from the days of 22 straight Final Fours and at least three national titles in three straight decades, including five in the 2000’s. As of Monday, with Princeton ending their 25-year title drought, ‘Cuse is now the owner of the second-longest drought of the 12 teams that have won the national championship, two years shorter than Johns Hopkins.
It’s been 17 years, but title-or-bust is still the mantra in the 315. Joey and his classmates failed to deliver on the promises that were made, both inside and outside of the program, of getting the Orange back on top of the mountain.
But there is a big difference between failing at a goal and being failures.
When they arrived, the program was bereft of talent, coming off a 4-10 season that was the worst since 1975, having missed the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2007. They already hadn’t been to Championship Weekend in a decade. They were essentially irrelevant on the national stage aside from their name recognition.
Over four years, they progressively built the program back up from the ashes of 2022. It wasn’t a completely linear climb back up the ladder; there were slips and falls along the way. There were some bad and even embarrassing results, but plenty of big and important triumphs, too, as they built into their careers.
Joey was the perfect representative of it. We saw him grow and mature over the course of his career. We saw him make better decisions and improve as a leader. We heard about his work ethic and watched him go up to Canada every summer to continue developing his game in the indoor league.
Alongside, his classmates and the program as a whole built to a winning record in year one, a NCAA Quarterfinal appearance in year two, and back-to-back Final Fours that ended an almost-unthinkable 12-year drought and returned the school to national relevancy.
In the end, they fell short of their ultimate goal. As has been said before, they don’t celebrate Final Four teams in Syracuse, and they certainly don’t hang banners for them. Spallina knows that as well as anyone, and in the final press conference of his ‘Cuse career, he once again didn’t shy away from addressing it:
“Sadly, I lied. Frankly, you know, I said I was going to bring it back and win a championship. And, obviously, we didn’t get it done and, you know, it’s the way sports is. It’s the way life is. Luckily enough for myself, I get to keep playing the sport that I love. Not luckily enough, I don’t get to do it wearing a Syracuse jersey. I love this place. I would do anything for it…There’s nowhere else I would have rather played. This place is unbelievable. It just sucks that we couldn’t get it done”.
Joey couldn’t help lead the program back to the promised land. But he and his classmates were brave enough to publicly state their highest-of-high goals. And when it failed, he was brave enough to sit there and acknowledge as much, even phrasing it in a way that put all the blame on himself when he said ‘I lied’.
He did it all while representing the university, the program and the No. 22 in the best way possible amidst a constant onslaught of criticism in the age of online debate.
Joey and his teammates may have failed in achieving their ultimate goal, but their time here was far from a failure.
They have left the program in a far better place than they found it. The excitement, the juice, and even the Dome Gods have returned after lying dormant in the years that preceded them. And as the Orange turn to seek what’s next, they’ll look to build off the good work that was put in by this group of senior leaders.
