Terrapins' lacrosse players snagged three of the four ACC weekly lacrosse honors

It's lacrosse season and that means the ACC will have to at least occasionally concede that that there's some talent up in this neck of the woods. And that talent spans men's and women's lacrosse. So here's who won this week:

From men's lacrosse:

Starting in goal for Maryland, and winning the ACC Defensive Player of the Week, number 31, senior, Niko Amato. Why Niko? Well, the 11 saves he made in Maryland's 16-8 win at Syracuse Saturday probably had something to do with it. The fact that two of those saves came with Syracuse holding a non-releasable man advantage likely helped. If that's not enough, think about this: While acknowledging that the season is young, Amato and the rest of the Terrapins defense held a potent Orange attack ten goals below their season average.

Two of Syracuse's first three shots found the net. The third Orange goal came with 4:53 to play in the first quarter. From that point until the end of the third quarter - a full 34:53 of game time - Syracuse managed only three additional goals. Their two fourth period goals came long after the game's outcome had been determined. Congratulations, Niko.

And from women's lacrosse:

Not to be outdone by her men's squad counterpart, redshirt junior goalkeeper Abby Clipp also snagged the ACC's Defensive Player of the Week honor. I think in regard to this award it's a simple case of numerus ipsa loquitur - the number speaks for itself. For Clipp, the number was twenty-one. That's 21 as in saves, not 21 as in her birthday and now she can go to Looney's. After playing the second half against Boston University and recording three saves last Wednesday, Clipp clearly put up the game of her career in Happy Valley on Saturday. As for where that stands in Maryland history, Denise Wescott holds the Maryland record for saves in a game with 24 - a record she set in 1977. Clipp's performance in goal helped the Terrapins overcome a rare shot deficit and played an important role in securing Maryland's 14-7 win over seventh ranked Penn State.

Probably because they simply couldn't stomach the thought of giving Maryland players a clean sweep in the awards, Brooke Griffin has to share her Offensive Player of the Week award with Kayla Treanor of Syracuse. Let's compare their weeks, shall we? Syracuse played one game last week - an 18-14 win at ninth ranked Virginia. In that game, Traenor scored five goals including being credited with the game winner. She added two assists.

Maryland played two games last week. In the Terps' 18-8 win at home over Boston University, Griffin scored two goals and had two assists - a line quite comparable to Treanor's albeit Griffin's came in a home game against an inferior opponent. So let's mosey up the road and take a look at how Griffin fared in the game at seventh ranked Penn State. Griffin scored seven goals and picked up an assist in the Terps' 14-7 win. That's half the goals Maryland scored and as many goals as the entire Penn State squad. Lest you think Griffin was some sort of gunner, she took exactly seven shots. That's right. She scored on every shot she took against the number seven team in the country and none of them were free position shots. Co-Offensive Player of the week, indeed.