The selling of college lacrosse's 2003 final four at Ravens Stadium will begin in earnest any day, when ticket brochures are mailed to anyone who used a credit card to attend the most recent NCAA men's championships at Rutgers and Maryland.
The organizers of the first final four in Baltimore, however, are looking well beyond next Memorial Day and the two-year contract they have with the NCAA.
"We don't want this just for two years," said Marty Schwartz, the tournament director. "The NCAA has said that they'll look at holding it here for another 10 years if we do a bang-up job. For that to happen, we need to put 40,000 in the seats."
Schwartz oversees a venture that includes the Ravens, the Maryland Stadium Authority and Baltimore's four Division I programs: Johns Hopkins, Loyola, Towson and UMBC.
Just as Omaha, Neb., has become baseball's backdrop for the College World Series, those six parties share a vision of making Baltimore the permanent home of college lacrosse's climactic weekend.
Baltimore has the endorsement of the game's most successful coaches, like Princeton's Bill Tierney, Syracuse's John Desko and Virginia's Dom Starsia. All grew tired of having to dodge the home-field advantage the Terps have at Byrd Stadium, which was the site of seven of the eight final fours from 1993 to 2000.
In 1995 and '97, the semifinals drew more than 30,000 to College Park. Last year's semifinal crowd at Rutgers was just over 23,000. Capacity at Ravens Stadium, without opening the upper deck, will be 40,000. The local organizing committee - its Web site, lax4baltimore.com, should be up by month's end - has as its goal a semifinal sellout.
Approximately 8,000 seats at the club level will cost $60 for the weekend package, which includes the Division I semifinals on May 24, the divisions II and III title games on May 25 and the Division I final on May 26.
The cost of a basic ticket package has gone up to $40, but, for the first time, fans won't have to move to a smaller venue to find the Division II final.
The field at Ravens Stadium has looked better. How will it handle five games in three days next May? The grounds crew is planning to have crease areas that can be replaced -- think of the method a golf greenskeeper uses to change a hole location.
It will be easier to gain a berth in the Division I tournament with the field expanding to 16, but that may just mean more teams chasing Princeton, which will be favored to claim its second title in three years behind a nucleus that includes Gilman grads Ryan Boyle and Damien Davis.
Roster changes
Coaches are putting the finishing touches on their incoming recruiting classes - the early letter-of-intent period opens Nov. 13 - and then they'll turn their attention to the 2003 campaign.
Loyola and Maryland missed last spring's tournament after unsettling autumns, but new blood and smoother fall ball sessions figure to have both back in the final four mix next spring.
Dave Cottle's second fall at Maryland was marked by serenity and the addition of a pair of transfers who will help him further open up the Terps' offense.
Brian Hunt, a graduate student with a year of eligibility remaining, led Yale in scoring in 2000 and 2001. Justin Smith was UMBC's top scorer last season. Freshman Joe Walters of Irondequoit, N.Y., will also make an immediate impact.
When Cottle moved from Loyola to College Park in September 2001, the Greyhounds filled their vacancy by hiring former assistant Bill Dirrigl. His transition was rocky because Rutgers wouldn't release him from his contract for fall ball and wouldn't allow one of his recruits to go with him to Baltimore without sitting out a season.
Dirrigl was delighted to be fully involved in the most recent fall session, and to have at his disposal Craig Georgalas, the freshman midfielder who followed him down from Rutgers. Attackman Gunnar Goettelmann is back after sitting out 2002 for academic concerns, and Greg Economou, a transfer from Nassau, will help out at midfield.
Johns Hopkins shouldn't have any difficulty replacing Rhodes Scholar candidate P.J. DiConza. It has the best crop of freshman defensemen in the nation and Greg Raymond back after a two-year rehabilitation of a knee.
Zak Smith's faceoff work was a bright spot for Towson last season, and the improvement of Ben DeFelice at the X could give the Tigers the best 1-2 combination in the nation.
Plebes Ian Dingman, John Birsmer and Taylor Harris will add punch to the offense at Navy, where Seth DiNola earned the goalie spot vacated by Jon Higdon. Likewise, UMBC expects points from rookies Andy Gallagher and Brendan Mundorf.
Defenseman Dan DiPietro transferred from Hopkins to Syracuse.
Schedule upgrades
The expansion of the Division I field gave premier programs even more freedom to beef up their schedules. Duke-Hopkins, Georgetown-Maryland, Maryland-Notre Dame and Loyola-Princeton are some new pairings that can be found in 2003.