As the highest ranked team in the South Region of the NCAA Division III tournament and a 10-time national champion, No. 3 Salisbury would appear to have a sturdy path to the title game in Philadelphia on May 29.
But nothing is guaranteed, and that reality was reinforced through the first two rounds of the postseason. No. 2 Rochester Institute of Technology was stunned by No. 11 Amherst, 17-14, in Saturday's second-round game.
Wednesday's first round featured upset losses for No. 9 Middlebury (11-10 vs. Springfield), No. 10 Stevenson (15-10 vs. No. 15 Cabrini), No. 12 Western New England (13-5 vs. SUNY-Cortland) and No. 18 Keene State (10-7 vs. Montclair State).
Coach Jim Berkman said the Sea Gulls (20-1) are vigilant about the pitfalls awaiting them in the tournament.
"The tournament is down to eight really good teams. So I think that our kids are smart enough to realize that at this point, everybody is very capable and everybody comes with great resume and everybody comes with a cast of characters that is a little bit deeper than some of the teams we have played in the first couple of rounds," he said Monday morning."
Salisbury clashed with six opponents that earned berths in the postseason and won six of seven games in those meetings. (The team went 1-1 against No. 7 York.) Berkman said that regular-season schedule helped prepare the team for No. 6 Denison (18-1), which visits Sea Gull Stadium at 7 p.m. Wednesday for a quarterfinal game.
"We've played a lot of teams of that caliber," he said. "It's not going to be like, 'Oh, we're playing this really good team, and we haven't played that level of team all year.' We've played teams of similar caliber. So we're used to playing at that level, we're used to playing at that pace, we're used to defending kids of that size, and we're used to playing teams as organized as they are on the defensive end."