Before his senior year at Gilman, Alex Wharton had whittled his list of prospective lacrosse programs to Cornell, Georgetown and Notre Dame. Four years later, the Baltimore native can chuckle about selecting the Fighting Irish - a decision that surprised his peers.
"All of my friends stayed east. So it was kind of like, 'Really? Why are you doing that?' " said Wharton, a senior attackman. "I did get some double takes."
Heads continue to turn at the mention of Notre Dame, but this time, the attention is complimentary.
The Irish - who meet No. 14 Loyola at 1 p.m. today at Diane Geppi-Aikens Field - are ranked No. 8 and have been mentioned as dark-horse candidates to advance deep into the NCAA tournament.
John Jiloty, editor-in-chief of Inside Lacrosse magazine, isn't ready to put Notre Dame in the same tier as Johns Hopkins, Duke and Virginia, but is impressed with the strides the program has made.
"They've really recruited well," Jiloty said, noting that 34 of the 43 players on Notre Dame are from lacrosse hotbeds on the East Coast. "They get a lot of kids from some nontraditional areas, but they also get a lot of kids from the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast as well. I think they've really done a good job of bringing together a pretty good variety of talented kids. They're making an impact, and they're going to be pretty good this year."
The Irish made their biggest splash nationally in 2001, when a team of nonscholarship players went 14-2 and advanced to the NCAA tournament semifinals, losing to Syracuse.
After that season, the university agreed to fund the program with scholarships and has continued to make a commitment to the team. Wood-paneled lockers replaced metal ones, flat-screen televisions have been installed in the coaches' offices, and the team has been permitted to watch game film in the same auditorium the football team uses.
The university is also building a $6 million lacrosse-only stadium scheduled to be finished in time for next season.
Those upgrades are recruiting tools that coach Kevin Corrigan is proud to use.
"Those kinds of things go along with taking that last step, which is always the difficult one - to go from being a consistent top-15 team to being a consistent top-five or -six team competing for a championship," he said. "We're planning to make those steps now."
Since the semifinal run in 2001, the Irish have had winning records five of the past six years and made tournament appearances the past two. In May, Notre Dame took eventual national champion Johns Hopkins to overtime before falling, 11-10, in the first round.
Asked whether the program can be mentioned with the powerhouses, Wharton said, "If not yet, I think we're right on the verge of it. We played Hopkins to one goal in overtime last year, and we played [2006 national champion] Virginia tighter than anyone did in the tournament. I think if we win one of those games, people are talking about us in a much different light. I think right now, we're probably not, but that's our goal. We want to be up there with the big-name schools."
Junior attackman Ryan Hoff, who played for Dulaney, said the players have not tried to squelch talk of competing for a national title.
"When you're a team that is building and starting to contend, you need to be forthright about your goals," Hoff said. "That's our ultimate goal, to win a national title. Not to get [to] the final four or to get to the national championship game. We want to win one."
edward.lee@baltsun.com