The Virginia men's lacrosse team is seeking to improve upon its six-game winning streak this weekend as it travels to Baltimore, Md. to take on Johns Hopkins University.
The Cavaliers (6-1) come into the game with the nation's longest winning streak of six games, most recently beating Towson (2-2) at Klöckner Stadium.
The Blue Jays (4-1), however, are no strangers to success. Johns Hopkins beat Princeton in double overtime earlier this month and is coming off of a convincing 17-9 win at Syracuse, bringing its win streak to four.
Junior co-captain Ben Rubeor will aim to continue his strong performance as he posted career numbers last weekend against Towson. Rubeor scored a career-high seven goals against Towson and has stepped up to become a team leader this year after the Cavaliers lost five seniors last season. He is only the eighth player in school history to score more than 50 goals after two seasons and needs just eight points to become the 38th 100-point scorer in the history of the program.
This weekend will be a showcase of arguably two of the most talented squads in the country, and the game is likely to come down to the wire. Hopkins is known for its large and unruly crowds and Virginia will look to prove it has enough mental toughness to overcome this distraction.
"When you are playing a team with as much talent as Hopkins has, it's going to come down to the mental aspect more so than necessarily the physical," Rubeor said.
This weekend will also be a bit of a homecoming for Rubeor, who is from the Baltimore area. Rubeor's high school teammate, freshman Michael Kimmel, plays midfield for the Blue Jays, and there are at least 10 players on the team Rubeor faced during his high school career.
The Cavaliers will have to contain freshman Steven Boyle, who notched a career-high four goals in Hopkins' win against Syracuse. Boyle is the Blue Jays' leading scorer this season with 12 goals and has the potential to ignite the offense. On the other side of the ball, Virginia, led by Rubeor and senior midfielder Drew Thompson, will look to get the best of the Blue Jays' defense.
"There are going to be a key couple of match-ups Saturday that we are going to want to look at, and they have a good goalie so we have to work on shooting good shots and taking the right shots" Thompson said.
Hopkins' goalie, senior Jesse Schwartzman, posted a season-high 17 saves against Syracuse last week and in doing so, became the eighth goalie in Hopkins history to amass 400 career saves -- he has 401 to his credit.
Virginia coach Dom Starsia understands the importance of Saturday's game but does not want the game to distract the team from the rest of its season.
"It's still only the month of March and we need to prepare for this game much like we have for others and much like we are going to have to for games coming up" Starsia said. "For all of us, going to play at Johns Hopkins is one of the reasons why you come to the University of Virginia: to play teams like this."
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