Unscientific Predictions: 2017 Big East Women’s Lacrosse Postseason Awards

The Big East women’s lacrosse regular season wraps up over the weekend with the final set of five games spread across Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. With that in mind, we’re going to pick the postseason awards for the league before things come to an end. It’s entirely possible that the last weekend of games could end up shifting the awards around a bit as a lot of these are very close calls.

Onwards then.....

Attacker of the Year: Sammi Burgess, Florida

This could go in a lot of different directions. Marquette’s Julianna Shearer is leading the Big East in goals. Connecticut’s Grace Nolan is leading the league in points. Cincinnati’s Monica Borzillo is second in points per game by ranking 10th in goals and 3rd in assists. Mollie Stevens, Burgess’ own teammate, has the team lead in goals. Ultimately, though, Burgess is the points leader for the undefeated first place team in the conference, and I think you have to go in that direction as a result. She’s also a senior and she had more Attacker of the Week awards (3) than anyone else this season.

Midfielder of the Year: Francesca Whitehurst, Georgetown

I do not have a good reason for this, other than she won three Midfielder of the Week awards late in the season, and three is more than anyone else did all season. Temple’s Morgan Glassford has been good for the Owls on both ends of the field this season, and Denver’s Elizabeth Behrins and Florida’s Sydney Pirreca both had two MOTW awards along the way, as did Glassford. Whitehurst does rank ninth in the Big East in assists per game if you’re looking for a statistical reason for this.

Defensive Player of the Year: Caroline Fitzgerald, Florida

She was the preseason DPOY and she won two weekly editions of the award. No, I don’t have much else to go on here. Denver’s Layne Voorhees has a solid argument as she had two DPOW awards as well, and she’s fifth in ground balls and second in caused turnovers.

Goalkeeper of the Year: Haley Hicklen, Florida

Hicklen is second in the Big East amongst regular netminders in goals-against average (8.65) and tops in the league in save percentage (.487). Denver’s Maddy Stevenson is first/second in both of those categories, so it wouldn’t be crazy to see her get the trophy.

Freshman of the Year: Monica Borzillo, Cincinnati

I mentioned her briefly above as a possible candidate for Attacker of the Year, so yeah, she gets this award. Borzillo has five Freshman of the Week awards, more than anyone else, on top of finishing second in the league in points per game and third in assists per game. This should be a runaway decision. Villanova’s Katie Comerford is the next best option, but she’s averaging 0.02 goals per game more than Borzillo, so it’s not like that’s really distinguishing her.

Coach of the Year: Amanda O’Leary, Florida

The Gators are 8-0 in league play, 14-2 overall, and ranked #2 in the country. Their only losses are to the teams ranked #1 and #3. This should be the obvious choice, but there is one slight hitch. Georgetown is 7-1 in league play this season and they play the Gators on Saturday. If the Hoyas swing the upset on the road and thus end up tied for the regular season title and earn the #1 seed in the conference tournament due to tiebreakers, then I can see GU’s Ricky Fried getting the nod here.

All-Big East Team

Elizabeth Behrins, M, Denver
Taylor Bresnahan, D, Florida
Sammi Burgess, A, Florida
Caroline Fitzgerald, D, Florida
Morgan Glassford, M, Temple
Haley Hicklen, GK, Florida
Grace Nolan, A, Connecticut
Sam Scarfogliero, D, Villanova
Julianna Shearer, A, Marquette
Mollie Stevens, A, Florida
Layne Voorhees, D, Denver
Francesca Whitehurst, M, Georgetown

I already mentioned 10 of the 11 women here in the individual award sections, so that explains that pretty well. The only other one is Sam Scarfogliero, who leads the Big East in caused turnovers per game at 2.13 and she’s also tops in ground balls per game as the only woman grabbing up more than three every time out.