With three ranked opponents in each of its first three games, Johns Hopkins men’s lacrosse was going to find out quickly how good it could be.
The vibes on Charles Street are high after the No. 8 Blue Jays turned back No. 10 Georgetown for an 11-6 victory Saturday afternoon before an announced 1,205 at Homewood Field.
Hopkins (3-0) collected its third win in eight days and opened the season with triumphs over No. 14 Denver on Feb. 1, No. 17 Towson on Tuesday and now the Hoyas. The program opened the season with three consecutive wins against ranked opponents for the first time since 2002 when that squad defeated then-No. 1 Princeton (8-5 on March 2), then-No. 13 Hofstra (9-8 on March 9) and then-No. 1 Syracuse (9-8 on March 16).
“Massive win, massive first week as well,” junior midfielder Matt Collison said. “All of my first three years here, we had those three games in the first eight days and always came out 2-1. But this is huge for our group. It’s a gritty win against a great Georgetown team that is well-coached and has players up and down their roster who can really make a difference in the game.”
Added graduate student goalkeeper Luke Staudt: “I think it kind of affirms what we can be, but I think it’s also important to know that it can change what we do going forward. It is a special group, and this is a special program, but I think we also have as tough a schedule as anyone in the country, and it starts with another big game and another tense environment next week [at Loyola Maryland].”
Collison tied his career high in points with five on three goals and two assists, and sophomore attackman Hunter Chauvette did the same with four points on three goals and one assist. Junior midfielder Brooks English racked up four points on one goal and a career high-tying three assists as the Blue Jays converted 44% of their shots (11 of 25).
Unlike last season, when attackman Jacob Angelus (25 goals and 44 assists) was the offense’s playmaker and attackman Garrett Degnon (47 goals and seven assists) was the top sniper, Hopkins has relied on a multi-pronged approach under new offensive coordinator Brian Kelly, who was promoted from working with the goalies after John Crawley left in June to become the coach at High Point.
Five Blue Jays have at least two assists, and eight players have found the net two times or more. Collison said the numbers are representative of a greater versatility emphasized by Kelly and coach Peter Milliman.
“Coach Milliman and Coach Brian Kelly did a really good job coming into the fall of identifying, ‘Hey, listen, we graduated a lot of goals in Garrett and a lot of assists in Jacob,’” Collison said. “But at the end of the day, we’re all playmakers, and playmakers make plays, and we’ve got guys on our first and second line that can play the ball, shoot the ball, and score.”
Trailing 2-1 midway through the first quarter, the Blue Jays scored four unanswered goals in a 10:36 stretch spanning the first two periods to regain a 5-2 lead. Collison and English each had a goal and an assist during that spurt.
After graduate student attackman Fulton Bayman dunked a skip pass by graduate student attackman Aidan Carroll midway through the second quarter, Hopkins embarked on a 3-0 run in a 13:22 span stretching over the second and third quarters to extend its advantage to 8-3 with 8:23 left in the frame.
As impressive as the offense was, the defense might have been even better. Tasked with containing a Hoyas offense that found the net 13 times in a seven-goal romp over Loyola Maryland on Feb. 1, the Blue Jays held Georgetown to its lowest output since May 22, 2021, when that squad scored only three goals in an 11-goal setback to Virginia in an NCAA Tournament quarterfinal.
Hopkins shut out the Hoyas for 15:54 before Bayman’s goal with 8:36 left in the second quarter, another 16:53 until freshman midfielder Kevin Miller scored on a stepdown shot from up top with 6:43 to go in the third period, and then 18:40 before senior midfielder Kade Goldberg converted a skip pass from Carroll. The defense’s performance helped negate a 9-2 disadvantage on faceoffs in the first half.
“Definitely keep them out of the middle,” said Staudt, a Loyola Maryland transfer who made a game-high six saves. “They’re aggressive dodgers, and they can shoot the heck out of the ball. So we wanted to minimize their angles, which makes my life a lot easier. And then just get into their gloves, especially the guys with poles, and trusting our footwork, trusting our coaches and preparation. It’s all the things we’ve talked about.”
As pleased as he was by the final score, Milliman downplayed whether the game marked the Blue Jays’ most complete performance of the season.
“The defense really kept us in a good place the whole game,” he said. “They were steady the whole way through, and we found our opportunities offensively. I don’t think we really excelled in a whole lot of areas, but we played well against a really good team.”
Bayman, a Notre Dame transfer, compiled two goals and one assist, and Carroll accumulated one goal and two assists. Freshman faceoff specialist Ross Prince won 11 of 17 draws and picked up two ground balls, but Georgetown (1-1) missed out on its first 2-0 start since 2022 and lost for the sixth time in seven all-time meetings with Hopkins.
“They out-IQed us, out-subbed us, they did a lot of the little things that we talked about during the week,” coach Kevin Warne said. “They did it better than us and out-executed us early on. Maybe youth, maybe inexperience, but bad job coaching by me. We’ve got to get it fixed immediately.”
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UP NEXT
No. 8 Johns Hopkins at Loyola Maryland
Saturday, noon
Stream: ESPN+