Salisbury University, the 12-time defending CAC champion and two-time defending NCAA Division III champion, was the unanimous pick as the preseason favorite by the conference coaches heading into the 2015 women's lacrosse season. A much more difficult job for the CAC coaches than picking SU as the top team is to figure out how to beat coach Jim Nestor's squad.
Salisbury collected first place votes from all eight opposing coaches (coaches are prohibited from voting for their own team) to land atop the poll with 64 points.
The Sea Gulls boast the return of All-Americans Bethany Baer on the attack and Laura Maskell on the defense from a team that went 23-1 in 2014, capped by a 9-6 victory over Trinity (Conn.) University in the second-straight year the teams met in the NCAA title game.
There is always at least one solid contender for the title – evidenced by the fact that the CAC received two bids to the NCAA Tournament in each of the past nine years (and several times, it could be argued that a third team was deserving of an NCAA bid).
York, which finished second in the regular season the last two years and played SU in the CAC title game in each of the past three years, was picked by every coach to finish second in the standings this year. The Spartans rank second in the poll with 56 points.
Mary Washington and Christopher Newport were picked to battle for third place in the regular-season standings. UMW, which was nationally ranked throughout most of the 2014 season, collected 47 points for third place in the CAC preseason poll while CNU gained 44 points, including one first-place vote, to rank fourth.
Another close battle emerged in the race for fifth place, where St. Mary's ranked with 36 points, but is expected by the coaches to be challenged by sixth-place Marymount (29 points) and seventh-place Frostburg State (25 points). Wesley (13 points) and Southern Virginia (10 points) completed the 2015 CAC preseason poll.
The 2015 season opens Saturday (Feb. 14) when Christopher Newport (Washington & Lee) and St. Mary's Va. Wesleyan) host Old Dominion Athletic Conference non-conference rivals. The first CAC tussle is slated for March 7, when Southern Virginia, in its first year of eligibility to qualify for the CAC playoffs, visits Mary Washington.
The nine CAC squads will by vying for six berths in the conference playoffs, which begin with a pair of first-round matches on Tuesday, April 21 and culminate with the title contest on Saturday, May 2 at the site of the highest seeded team.
2015 CAC Women's Lacrosse Preseason Coaches Poll
1. Salisbury (8 first-place votes) - 64 points
2. York - 56 points
3. Mary Washington - 47 points
4. Christopher Newport (1 first-place vote) - 44 points
5. St. Mary's - 36 points
6. Marymount - 29 points
7. Frostburg State - 25 points
8. Wesley - 13 points
9. Southern Virginia - 10 points