PHILADELPHIA – The University of Pennsylvania men's lacrosse team has hit a hot streak at just the right time, riding that momentum through a pair of wins at the Ivy League Tournament and an NCAA Championship first-round win over Richmond the last two weekends. On Saturday, a trip to Championship Weekend is on the line as the third-seeded Quakers meet sixth-seeded Rutgers in a quarterfinal.
 
Penn-Rutgers is the first of two games at Hofstra's James. M. Shuart Stadium on Saturday, the second quarterfinal pitting No. 4 Yale and No. 5 Princeton. The winners of both games move on to Championship Weekend, which takes place Memorial Day Weekend at Rentschler Field in East Hartford, Conn. The other quarterfinals take place on Sunday at Ohio Stadium in Columbus, Ohio, No. 1 Maryland meeting Virginia and No. 7 Cornell facing Delaware. (The winner of Penn-Rutgers will play the winner of Cornell-Delaware in a semifinal.)
 
#3 PENN (11-4) vs. #6 RUTGERS (14-3)
NCAA Championship quarterfinal
Saturday, May 21, 2022 | Noon
James M. Shuart Stadium | Hempstead, N.Y.
Watch on ESPNU ($) | Live Stats | Tickets
 
The Penn-Rutgers Series
*The Quakers and Scarlet Knights are meeting for the 35th time overall, with Rutgers leading the series 28-6; that said, this is the first matchup between the teams since 1986.

Oh (Former) Captain! My (Former) Captain!
Saturday's game will pit the Quakers against one of their 2021 captains. Mitch Bartolo is a grad transfer on the Rutgers roster and in fact is the Scarlet Knights' second-leading scorer this season with 41 goals and 57 points. Last week, he was drafted by the Redwoods in the fourth round of the 2022 PLL Draft.

Penn in the NCAA Championship
*The Quakers are making their 14th appearance in the NCAA's postseason event and playing their ninth quarterfinal game. (Several of those previous QF games came when the field was eight teams and so the first round was QF.)
 
*Penn is in the quarterfinal round for the second straight time; the Quakers made it in 2019, losing an epic battle to Yale, and then the Ivy League did not play in the 2021 Championship.
 
*This is Penn's fourth NCAA appearance under current head coach Mike Murphy; the Quakers have won as many NCAA games under Murphy (2) as they had in their entire history prior to his arrival.
 
*Penn's 3 seed is tied for the highest in program history; the Quakers also were the 3 seed in 1984, when the NCAA held an eight-team championship. Penn hosted and lost to sixth-seeded Army in the first round, 8-7.
 
Penn Men's Lacrosse by the Numbers
1 • Games this season in which senior Dylan Gergar has not scored multiple goals (he had one against Cornell on March 26); the attackman had two in last Saturday's win over Richmond.
 
2 • Ivy League Tournament records set by senior keeper Patrick Burkinshaw: saves in a game (20 vs. Brown) and saves in a tournament (36).
 
3 • Goals scored by the "Cardiac Quakers" in the final seconds of games already this season. James Shipley tied the Duke game with two seconds left, then a week later won the Penn State game with one second left. A week after that, Gergar scored at Villanova with one second left to give the Quakers an 8-7 win over the Wildcats.
 
3 • Penn's ranking in the USILA and Inside Lacrosse national polls entering the NCAA Championship.
 
4 • Penn players who were named Inside Lacrosse All-America last Sunday: seniors Sam Handley (first-team), Piper Bond (HM) and BJ Farrare (HM), and sophomore Brendan Lavelle (HM).
 
4 • Penn players who have earned spots on the USILA Division I Team of the Week this season: Gergar on March 1, Lavelle on March 15, Handley on March 22, and face-off specialist Jamie Zusi on April 25.
 
4 • Ivy League teams still playing this weekend; three of them are here at Hofstra (Penn, Princeton, Yale) while Cornell is at Ohio State tomorrow.
 
5 • Overtime games this season for Penn, a program record. (The previous mark of four was originally set in 2011.) The Quakers are 3-2 in those games, the losses at Princeton and at Yale and the wins coming over Duke, Saint Joseph's and last Saturday vs. Richmond.
 
5 • Tewaaraton Award finalists, a group that includes Handley; he is the first Penn player to make the Final Five.
 
5.88 • Points per game recorded by Handley in eight games against Ivy foes this season, after his 12-point weekend at the Ivy League Tournament.
 
6 • Points by Ben Smith last Saturday vs. Richmond (5g/1a); both the goal and point totals were season/career highs for the freshman. Smith has 22 points over the last six games (3.7 ppg) after recording just four four points combined across Penn's first nine contests.
 
6 • The combined margin in Penn's four losses this season (one-goal losses at Princeton and Yale, two-goal losses to Georgetown and Brown).
 
7 • Consecutive wins heading into Saturday's game with Rutgers, Penn's longest streak since winning 12 in a row in 2019 (a streak ended in the NCAA quarterfinal round by Yale, 19-18 in OT).
 
8 • Assists by Handley against Princeton on March 19, one shy of the single-game program record held since 1969 by Richard Bennett (set against Drexel).
 
8.67 • Penn's assists-per-game average in Ivy League play, tops among the Ancient Eight programs; the Quakers then had 19 assists on their 30 goals at the Ivy Tournament last weekend.
 
14 • Penn's 47-man roster features players from 14 different states and Washington, D.C. That said, the traditional lacrosse hotspots are well represented (12 Maryland, 7 New York).
 
14:03 • Amount of game time needed by junior Gabe Furey to record all of his team-high five points (3g/2a) in Penn's win over Saint Joseph's on April 26; he scored his first goal with 2:24 left in the third (making the score 9-5 Hawks), and his final goal came with 3:21 left in the fourth (making it 12-11 Hawks).
 
16 • Points by Handley so far in postseason play (7 vs. Brown, 5 vs. Yale, 4 vs. Richmond); that gives him 70 for the season which is second on Penn's single-season list behind only Peter Hollis (75 in 1977).
 
16 • Players who have scored this season for Penn; Jack Joyce became the latest, scoring in the Ivy Tournament semifinal win over Brown.
 
22 • Points accumulated by Furey over Penn's last eight games (2.8 ppg); the junior has multiple points in all but one game during that span, including a career-high three assists vs. Richmond.
 
23 • Combined wins across Penn's last two full seasons—12 in 2019, which tied a program record for wins in a season, and 11 in 2022.
 
25 • Years since Penn had beaten Yale by seven or more goals, prior to the Quakers' 16-9 win in the Ivy League Tournament final (18-9 in 1997).
 
48 • Goals by Gergar this season; that is second on Penn's single-season list, behind only Gergar's former teammate Adam Goldner (56 in 2019).
 
64.6 • Burkinshaw's save percentage across Penn's three postseason games to date (51 saves, 28 goals allowed).
 
68.0 • Face-off win percentage by Zusi last Saturday (17/25); he has been over .500 in all three postseason games the last two weekends.