I think the 2024 men’s college season will be one of the best in recent memory. This will be the last season significantly affected by the NCAA’s decision not to count the 2020 season as a year of eligibility. (A handful of players who entered college in the fall of 2020 and redshirted in 2021, 2022, or 2023, may choose to use their fifth year of eligibility in 2025.) Although I think any of the “Big 4” schools could win the NCAA championship, I predict UCLA will win.
Here are my predictions:
First. UCLA (ceiling 1, floor 2). UCLA may have more talent and depth than any team in the NCAA era. UCLA has two Olympians and two or three potential Olympians. They are at least two deep at every position and four deep at center and center defender. UCLA’s “second team” would be a top six team. If Adam Wright starts a LH attacker (Ben Liechty or Wade Sherlock), an Olympian (Ryder or Chase Dodd), a 2023 1st team All-American (Jack Larsen), or a 2023 2nd team All-American (Mo Kenney) will not start. As Rb notes elsewhere in this thread, having this much depth is not always a good thing. We’ll see how Adam Wright manages playing time and expectations. I don’t think UCLA will go undefeated. However, unless they lose more than one key player to an injury, I don’t see anyone beating them in the NCAA tournament.
Second. Stanford (ceiling 1, floor 5). This is year 3 of the Brian Flacks regime. If anyone doubted whether Flacks would be able to recruit at Stanford, Stanford’s incoming class should put those doubts to rest. Consider this starting lineup comprised of seven incoming Stanford players:
Goalie – West Temkin (transfer from Princeton, 2023 junior national team, potential 2028 Olympian)
Center-defender – Orestis Zervoudakis (2024 Greek youth national team)
Center – Dash McFarland (transfer from UCSB, 2nd team college All-American in 2023)
Center – Will Schneider (JSerra Class of 2024, 2023 junior national team, potential senior national team player)
Attacker – Botand Balogh (one of the best players on the Hungarian team that won the Youth World Championships in July)
Attacker – Ryan Ohl (Brunswick Class of 2024, 2023 junior national team, potential senior national team player)
Attacker – Ben Forer (Northgate Class of 2024, 2024 youth national team)
One point to anyone who can name a better incoming class from any school during the NCAA era.
Flacks’s best teams at Harvard-Westlake had very good to great centers. With all due respect, one couldn’t say the same thing about Stanford’s 2022 and 2023 teams. McFarland and Schneider give Flacks two strong centers to work with this season. Stanford has two potential 2028 Olympic-team goalies: Temkin and Griffen Price. Most of the commentators on this website favor Temkin over Price. I think Price is the better passer and has a higher ceiling but he has had more injuries than Temkin and the current national team coaches seem to prefer Temkin. Having two goalies of roughly the same ability is not always a good thing because only one can start. As former Cal football coach Mike White said in 1973 when he had to choose between Vince Ferragamo (led the Los Angeles Rams to their first Super Bowl appearance) and Steve Bartkowski (the first pick in the 1975 NFL draft), you can’t have two first-string quarterbacks. My guess is that (1) Temkin and Price will share time during the regular season because neither of them will clearly outplay the other and (2) Flacks will start the one he believes is better in the MPSF and NCAA tournaments. If this is what Flacks does, I hope he follows Dusty Litvak’s 2023 Princeton model when Litvak started Temkin and Hungarian Kristof Kovacs the same number of games and didn’t pull the starting goalie every time he made a mistake. In my opinion, coaches that have a quick hook at goalie (or quarterback) are generally making a mistake. Stanford is loaded at the attacker position. If Stanford has a question mark, it’s the center-defender position. Redshirt senior Ethan Parrish, an excellent player, is likely to start at center defender but his best position is attacker.
Third. Cal (ceiling 1, floor 5). Cal, the 3x time defending NCAA champions, lost center Nikolaos Papanikolaou and goalie Adrian Weinberg from last year’s team. Papanikolaou and Weinberg would start on my all-time Cal team:
Goalie – Adrian Weinberg (3x NCAA champion, 1x Olympian)
Center defender – Jon Svendsen (3x NCAA champion, 1x NCAA POY, 2x Olympian, Hall of Fame)
LH center – Chris Humbert (3x NCAA champion, 2x NCAA POY, Cal’s all-time leading scorer, 3x Olympian, Hall of Fame)
Center - Nikolaos Papanikolaou (3x NCAA champion, 3x Cutino Award winner, 1x Greek Olympian)
LH attacker – Kevin Robertson (1x NCAA champion, 1x NCAA POY, 3x Olympian, Hall of Fame)
Attacker/center defender – Luca Cupido (1x NCAA champion, 1x Cutino Award winner, 3x Olympian, almost certainly a future Hall of Famer)
Attacker – Kirk Everist (2x NCAA champion as a player, 6x NCAA champion as a coach, 1x NCAA POY, 2x Olympian, Hall of Fame)
Coach – Pete Cutino (8x NCAA champion, Hall of Fame)
One point to anyone who can name a better all-time starting lineup from another college.
Cal returns 10 of the top 11 scorers from its 2023 team, including two 1st team All-Americans (Max Casabella and Roberto Valera) and one honorable mention All-American (LH attacker Albert Ponferrada). Cal’s incoming class includes freshman Patrik Kolak, 20, an attacker from Croatia with extensive international experience. Kolak is said to be an exceptional player, with one college coach saying he is a potential Cutino Award finalist and another saying he is “ridiculously” good. George Avakian and Jordi Gascon will share time at center. My guess is that Riley Clansen or Kai Seed will be the starting goalie by the end of the season. USC is the only school to win four or more NCAA championships in a row. If Kolak is as good as some people say, Cal could finish second. However, I don’t think they will win their 4th straight NCAA championship.
Fourth. USC (ceiling 2, floor 5). USC loses Massimo Di Martire form last year’s team but returns goalie Bernardo Herzer (honorable mention All-American in 2023), center Max Miller (1st team All-American in 2023), center defender Luka Brnetic (2nd team all-MPSF in 2023), LH attacker Zach Bettino (honorable mention All-American in 2023), and Carson Kranz (2nd team All-American in 2023). Incoming players include LH center Jack Martin (scored 35 goals for Stanford in 2022, did not play last year), redshirt freshman Stefan Brankovic (Brankovic, 23, played for Serbia in the 2022 FINA World League Super Final), and Robert Lopez Duart (2nd team All-American as a freshman for LBSU in 2023).
Fifth. Pacific (ceiling 3, floor 6). Pacific lost to Cal in the semifinals of the 2022 NCAA tournament. Five starters from that team redshirted last year but return for the 2024 season: goalie Bae Fountain (2022 honorable mention All-American, New Zealand senior national team), utility player Jeremie Cote (2x All-American, Canadian senior national team), Reuel D’Souza (2x All-American, Canadian senior national team), Mihailo Vukazic (NCAA all-tournament 1st team in 2022), and Matthew Hosmer. Center Oliver Fodor (transferred to Pacific from Wagner College where he scored 208 goals in three seasons) also redshirted in 2023. Stefan Vavic returns for his second season at Pacific. He was an honorable mention All-American in 2023. I predict Pacific will go undefeated during the regular season and win the West Coast Conference, automatically qualifying for the NCAA tournament. I think they will win their first-round game at the NCAA tournament and lose to one of the “Big 4” teams in the semifinals. If Pacific doesn’t win the West Coast Conference, I don’t think they will receive an “at large” bid for the NCAA tournament. Pacific isn’t doing itself or anyone else any favors by not playing a tougher regular-season schedule.
Sixth. LBSU (ceiling 5, floor not in the top 8). I think LBSU will beat U.C. Irvine in the Big West Conference championship game. LBSU has two good goalies: Aaron Wilson (2x All-American at U.C. Davis) and Liam Ward. In addition to Ward, LBSU’s returning players include utility player Bruno Chiappini (honorable mention All-American in 2023), Evan Cain (honorable mention All-American in 2023), Marc Frigola (scored 35 goals and had 28 assists as a freshman last year), and Caleb Francisco (scored 30 goals as a redshirt freshman last year). LBSU’s incoming class includes Wilson and center Gabi Acosta (played for Spain in the U20 European Championships in August). Acosta will join the team in mid-September; he is expected to be the starting center.
Seventh. Princeton (ceiling 5, floor not in the top 8). Dusty Litvak is one of the best coaches in the country. He should be a candidate for any openings at a “Big 4” school. It would be interesting to see how he would do at a school like UCSB. I don’t think Princeton will be as good as they were last season. However, I still expect them to make the NCAA tournament. Princeton’s returning players include goalie Kristoff Kovacs (honorable mention All-American in his freshman season last year), center defender Vladan Mitrovic (2x All-American), and Roko Pozaric (3x All-American, Cutino Award finalist in 2023).
Eighth. U.C. Irvine (ceiling 6, floor not in the top 8). U.C. Irvine’s returning players include goalie Jay Pyle, center Tyler Padua (2x honorable mention All-American), Luka Krstic (3rd team All-American in 2023), and Johann Thrall (honorable mention All-American in 2023). Not counting the “Big 4” schools, Irvine may have the best incoming domestic class with, among others, goalie Vince Vega (La Jolla), utility player Ethan Spoon (Huntington Beach), LH attacker Jay Hubbard (De La Salle), and Cole Francisco (Los Alamitos).
