Men's Lacrosse | 5/22/2019 5:10:00 PM
MOON TOWNSHIP, Pa. -- Two decorated leaders of this year's
Robert Morris men's lacrosse team will get one more chance to play before finally hanging up their helmets as collegians.
Defensemen and Class of '19 graduates
Jack Toomb and
Mike Eveland have been chosen to represent RMU in the 2019 USILA Senior All-Star Games, the United States Intercollegiate Lacrosse Association announced Wednesday. The Division I/II contest, which follows the D-III event, will face off at 7:30 p.m. EDT Friday at Tierney Field in Sparks, Maryland, part of US Lacrosse Headquarters, and both games will be streamed live on
Lax Sports Network (LSN).
As seniors, Toomb and Eveland helped make the 2019 season, the commemorative 15th for the men's program at Robert Morris, one to remember. With the former regularly coming off the bench as a long stick, and the latter starting 13 of 17 games while serving as one of four team captains, the Colonials overcame a 1-7 start with a team-record eight-game winning streak.
That streak culminated in the second Northeast Conference Tournament championship in team history and the second in a row. RMU took down the conference's top two regular-season finishers just about an hour west of US Lacrosse Headquarters, at Waldron Family Stadium in Emmitsburg, to become the first No. 4 seed in NEC history to take the tournament crown.
With that, the Colonials also captured their second all-time automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament. This gave Robert Morris University three NCAA Tournament participants in the same academic/athletic year for the first time ever and made them the fifth different RMU Athletics program to earn back-to-back NEC Tournament titles.
Toomb, a 6'3", 195-pound product of Archbishop Moeller High School, was a proverbial ground ball machine throughout his four years at RMU. The "Toomb Raider" collected 45 GB's on the season and 210 for his career, including four at No. 3 Virginia in his NCAA Tournament First Round outing May 11. On Apr. 20 at Bryant, the Cincinnati native became just the third player in Colonials history to register 200 ground balls all-time and the first defenseman to accomplish that feat.
His seven GB's versus Canisius Mar. 9, in a rematch of the Colonials' 2018 NCAA Opening Round victory over the Golden Griffins, were a season high and one shy of his single-game best. Meanwhile, Toomb topped Robert Morris in 2019 with his career-high 21 caused turnovers, and his 64 career CT's put him fifth on the all-time chart at RMU.
A three-time All-NEC Second Team selection, Toomb played in 65 career games as a Colonial, just one off the team record. He averaged 3.23 ground balls per contest, the fifth-best career clip in Robert Morris history, and his average of 0.98 caused turnovers per game ranks seventh.
Eveland, a Doylestown, Pennsylvania native and Central Bucks East standout, is enjoying his second USILA honor of the spring, in fact. The 5'10", 155-pound close defender was named to his first-ever USILA D-I Team of the Week Apr. 16 for his integral role in a Robert Morris upset of No. 17 Lehigh Apr. 10, the seventh win over a top-20 opponent in program history.
He helped the Colonials limit the Mountain Hawks to two goals over a span of 39:10, while scooping a team-best four ground balls, en route to that midweek victory. Three days later, Eveland grabbed four more GB's and caused two turnovers in another non-conference triumph, at Cleveland State.
Both he and Toomb also made offensive contributions of note this spring. Eveland, who improved upon his junior campaign with 17 ground balls and eight caused turnovers, also notched his first "long pole goal" in 56 games as a collegian in the Apr. 13 win at CSU, and Toomb assisted on the game-tying goal that opened the fourth-quarter scoring in the NEC Final versus Hobart May 4.
Eveland went on to play 61 career games for Robert Morris, tying him for ninth on the school's all-time chart, and he ended with 55 GB's and 32 forced miscues.
Together, Toomb and Eveland helped RMU shut out Hobart for the final 10:25 of regulation on their Senior Day Apr. 27, leading to a come-from-behind, overtime victory that put the Colonials in the postseason for the fourth straight year. Robert Morris blanked tournament host Mount St. Mary's for the final 18:55 of its dramatic NEC Semifinal comeback before playing another 14:37 of critical shutout ball against the Statesmen to clear a path to another championship.
The Colonials averaged 8.76 caused turnovers per game in 2019, which ranked second in the NEC, and their team CT average was second-highest among NCAA Tournament qualifiers entering the tournament.
The two 2019 seniors give Robert Morris nine USILA All-Star selections all-time (coaches not included) under
Andrew McMinn, coming off his eighth season at the helm, and ten in the program's entire history.
Toomb will wear No. 23, and Eveland No. 24, for the "South" All-Star Team on Friday.
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