It is time to apply all the lessons that Marquette men’s lacrosse has learned to this point of the season.
Marquette is 2-3 on the year, with all three losses coming in relatively competitive contests against ranked opponents. Maybe the final margin doesn’t look so hot, but each time, the Golden Eagles were running with Michigan or Notre Dame or Harvard until the ranked foe proved why they’re ranked and pushed away from Marquette. That happens when you’re not on the level of a ranked team. Nothing
wrong with that…
….. as long as you don’t let that affect what you’re doing the rest of the season.
Marquette’s next five games are against teams that are not ranked in the Inside Lacrosse media poll right now. One of them is earning votes, but that’s not actually the same thing as being in the top 20. It’s three non-conference games and the first two games of the Big East calendar. Because of the nature of the league slate, specifically how it’s organized for Marquette, it’s kind of critical that they start out 2-0 against Providence and St. John’s if they want to be in the conference tournament.
Five straight games against teams that in theory should be beatable. Every game is a little bit different, but at the very least, we’d have to say that these next five opponents aren’t on the same level as say, #4 Harvard or the currently top ranked Fighting Irish. The door would appear to be open for Marquette to take what they’ve learned about themselves through the first five games of the season and apply it to coming out on the winning side of the next five games. Maybe it doesn’t need to be a 5-0 streak, but again: Those first two Big East contests are going to be kind of critical so maybe 5-0 is what the Golden Eagles need.
One thing at a time, though. First up, handling the Bears. Then head coach Jake Richard and his guys can figure out what to do from there.
Game #6: vs Mercer Bears (3-3)
Date: Saturday, March 7, 2026
Time: 12pm Central
Location: Andy Glockner Memorial Bubble, Valley Fields, Milwaukee, Wisconsin
Streaming: ESPN+ with Matt Yeazel calling the action
Live Stats: Stat Broadcast
Marquette is 2-0 all time against Mercer. The first meeting was a 14-11 Golden Eagles win in 2013, and the second went 14-6 with Marquette ranked in the national polls at the time. Both games were in Georgia, so this will be the Bears’ first visit to Milwaukee.
It’s been three up and three down so far this season for Mercer, directly along in that order. 18-9 over Hampton, 13-9 over Marist, and 16-12 over VMI is how they started their season, and it’s been three straight losses since then for the Bears. Nothing bad to say about losing to #6 Richmond (although 15-5 wasn’t fun, I’m sure), but getting trampled by now-#9 Army (16-7) and roasted by Drexel (18-7) probably wasn’t how Mercer really wanted to spend their time.
The end result is that Lacrosse Reference has the Bears ranked #51 in offensive efficiency and #49 in defensive efficiency to this point of the year. I’d imagine they looked a little bit better than right on the edge of the bottom third of the country in both departments before they started taking lopsided losses, but at some point, you are what your numbers say you are, and about halfway through the season is probably one of those times.
Mercer has a trio of guys averaging more than two goals a game, and leading scorer Dillon Bush is juuuuuust short of averaging a hat trick. He has 17 goals in their six games as well as two assists for a team high 19 points. Will Zylstra is right behind Bush with 16 goals, while Michael Frederick has 12. Frederick also has a team high six assists to end up just one point behind Bush and one point ahead of Zylstra in that column. Bush has taken 61 of Mercer’s 251 shots, which is darn near a quarter of their attempts. More than half of those have been on frame, so it’s going to be important for Marquette’s defenders to not give him lanes to shoot and thus do Lucas Lawas a favor in net.
Speaking of netminders, Jacob Neuman has played all but 24 minutes in cage for the Bears this season, and that includes going the distance against Drexel last time out. He’s giving up 13.59 goals per 60 minutes of action and only stopping 46% of shots on frame. Mercer’s not doing too bad overall in terms of shots for and against, with just under three fewer shots per game than their opponents, but if Marquette can make solid choices with their shots and pepper Neuman, it would seem eventually the shots are going to find their way through to the back of the net.
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