Another year, another disappointing finish. The 2026 men’s lacrosse season started with incredible promise and sky high expectations. After the most accomplished year in the program’s history in 2025, this season was supposed to see that next step. A Final Four run was the expectation, not a hope. The team returned nearly all of its production at attack, returned the entire defense, the primary faceoff man, and hired a brand new offensive coordinator who oversaw an incredible run at VMI. A hint of trouble rippled the waters when news broke in February that Bobby van Buren would be out for the year. Concerning? Yes. End of the world? No. That sentiment was borne out early on in the year.
Through the first couple of games, everything went well. Genuinely well. The defense was playing well. The offense was too. Hidden gem freshmen started the season playing exceptional lacrosse. Everything was humming. Then came the turn.
The Ohio State offense scored 74 goals in the first 5 games, averaging nearly 15 goals per game. That is elite offense, despite the level of competition. Beginning with Georgetown in game 6, the wheels began to fall off, however. Our team in the Scarlet and Gray would not score 10 or more goals the remainder of the year following their 10-9 win over the Hoyas. The Buckeyes managed to score 9 against the Wolverines in their regular season finale, but that was the highest goal total in the back half of the schedule.
After scoring 74 goals in 5 games, Ohio State only managed 67 in the final 9. As you may surmise through rudimentary math, this is awful. They averaged literally half (7.4 gpg versus 14.8) of their early production. This was one of the most disappointing offensive seasons in the nine since 2017. There was absolutely no reason it should. have come to this. The big question is why? Why did this happen? Whose fault is it? And what needs to change moving forward?
The answers are simple, but difficult to solve. We will start with injuries Ohio State needs to take a long look at its athletic support staff to figure out who needs to be fired. In sheer numbers, this was one of the worst health seasons for the Buckeyes in recent memory. Russell Melendez played exactly one game, maybe, at something approaching full health. After that game early in the year, he was never the same.
Now, there are some other factors at play with this one. But at the same time, injuries imploded his season and career. Jack Deliberti played 7 games before getting injured, and played really well. His 6 points belie just how effective he was as a dodger. Brad Sharp, the best offensive middie on the roster this season, played just 5 games before going down injured for the year. Jackson Birtwistle missed 3 games as well. That’s just unacceptable. You can’t have four of your top offensive players go down with significant injuries. Something in training needs to be radically different.
Another reason for the offensive collapse was bad personnel. Full stop. Ohio State’s best offensive players from 2025 regressed painfully m 2026. Garrett Haas scored 3 more points in 2026, but needed 17 more shots to score 1 additional goal. His shot on goal percentage fell nearly 10% from last season. His turnovers increased 44%. Alex Marinier had a goal total in 2026 that was HALF of that in 2025. HALF. The 5-star freshman attackman (coming off a high school ACL tear) shot an abysmal .215 on 64 shots.
Khalif Hocker scored 14 goals, but it was neither efficient nor effective for Ohio State’s season hopes. Liam White matched that goal total but shot a similarly bad .233. Logan Soelberg, who was supposed to be a depth piece, shot .242 with a higher workload than was anticipated. Ohio State’s best shooting middie was Jackson Birtwistle, who was at a respectable .323. As a unit, even including the injured Brad Sharp, Ohio State's offensive midfielders shot just .254. It’s hard to describe just how unsatisfactory that number is for a program that’s scrambling to be in the elite of the sport.
Finally, the ultimate reason for Ohio State’s offensive collapse has to come down to bad management from the coaching staff. At all levels. The regression of the returning personnel falls on the inability of the staff to maintain any sort of offensive identity. I still don’t know that there’s anything that Ohio State consistently does year after year on offense. It’s definitely not a motion offense. There’s not a structure or scheme that they stick to. There’s no principles that the offense hangs its hat on year after year. That side of the ball has no plan, unlike the defense.
In terms of recruiting, Ohio State has done nothing but take transfers at the midfield position. Which, obviously, has extreme drawbacks if you do not hit on most of those players. There’s not a lot of rapport, guys are still trying to figure out the system that is supposed to be im place, and personal skill development is basically nonexistent. You can just see how little each returning player adds to their game year-to-year compared to other programs. This is especially true on the ball.
I think Jack Deliberti demonstrated the most diverse set of dodges this season, and we only saw that in short stints. Garrett Haas has the same dodges he did as a freshman. The transfers brought some new looks, but got injured fast. Those players that stayed healthy don’t have the skillset to dodge. And the one player who was intriguing in mop up duty as a dodger, Winter Rivera, didn’t play past February. Last year’s midfield in this year’s team would have likely made this squad a Final Four lock. But because the staff has routinely rebooted the entire midfield season after season, that is just a pipedream. So what needs to be done? That’s where things get tricky.
Ultimately, you all know where I stand on this. I do not think that it would make strategic or financial sense to continue with this staff. Full stop. Which is a really easy (or lazy, writing this) solution to just wrap the post up on. Even if I think this is becoming much more likely than not, for reasons I will allude to later. For argument’s sake, I'll lay out what I feel the best solutions would be for the issues Ohio State faces with a staff returning intact. We'll see on May 22™ (at the earliest) what shakes out in terms of a total revamp or some internal changes under the current regime. But let’s assume that the athletic department allows the current staff to stay in place. What would solutions be?
In the short, and long, term on offense, the Buckeyes need to figure out what in the heck they want to be. The only identifiable trait for Ohio State’s offense has been a lack of pace for the past decade. Ohio State doesn’t pass exceptionally well, doesn’t move off the ball well, doesn’t dodge particularly well, and hasn’t shown any interest in improving those facets at any point in the last 10 years. This team needs to choose an identity, implement it, and not allow anything to distract from its maintenance.
I don’t care if it is a 3 grade offense, the team needs something to hang its hat on. After that, the rest falls into place. A dodging offense? Recruit and retain players who excel with the ball in their stick, and can actually complete a dodge without turning it over. Same goes for a motion offense, or something analogous. But above all, they need to get middies.
Midfielders are not a dime a dozen, and it is absolutely paramount that Ohio State stop trying to convert attackmen into midfielders. It’s not the same position, it doesn’t work trying to shove square pegs into round holes, and there’s a decade of data showing that Ohio State sucks at using this formula.
The best midfielders Ohio State recruited were all midfielders in high school or their previous collegiate stop. Stick with what works. Nothing is worse than watching a converted attackman get bullied by an average LSM or shorty defender before throwing the ball | to another player. If Ohio State wants to be a serious program, it absolutely must figure out its personnel problems on offense. And probably also stop converting offensive players to defenders.
Finally, Ohio State has to really hammer the portal for replacement players. I can’t find an exact rundown, just generic statements, but this is shaping up to be an exodus for the ages on offense.
The latest righty goalscorer is out of eligibility in Alex Marinier. Russell Melendez 1s likely done with the sport. Logan Soelberg, Jackson Birtwistle, and Dillon Magee are gone. Oh, and in the latest breaking news, Garrett Haas will also be departing Columbus for a new destination. That’s 5 of the top 9 scorers departing Columbus, and easily the most efficient players at that. Which is where things are looking a little...interesting.
[The Buckeyes are showing a total lack of interest thus far in filling the gaps that have opened up in the offensive ranks. With two days of the portal being open complete, I can’t see a single indication that a player has even been contacted. Let alone recruited. The best options for next season have all already completed their 2026 campaigns. There’s no reason not to be reaching out to just about every name in the portal to at least see if there’s a shred of interest. And yet, it’s essentially been vacation time for the Buckeyes.
Myers was at Lafayette with his son. Purpura left for a day or two, then came back to Columbus. Crane is MIA. There’s just...nothing. The Board of Trustees committee on Talent, Compensation and Governance is meeting in 10 days. That’s just before a Friday news dump. And, for reference, by that same 22 May date in 2025, Ohio State was getting multiple commitments from transfers. At this point, they should be making calls and scheduling visits for this upcoming weekend. I’m not saying it is likely. But here’s some more context.
The current deal for the head coach and associated staff runs through June 2027. The buyout is $170,000 roughly, give or take, off an approximate $340,000 salary. In his last 10 outings, the head coach is 46 against the Wolverines. The Buckeyes haven’t won a national tournament game since 2017. They’ve only made the national tournament twice since that same year. You’re facing down a complete and total reboot of the offensive roster once more, with a staff that is literally on lame-duck status. Additionally, the program has shown no signs of consistent improvement. Fully 8 years after the height of the program’s trajectory, Ohio State lucked into its most accomplished season on record, with a pair of Big Ten titles to show for it. Only to lose embarrassingly at home to a Notre Dame squad that pulverized it.
Ultimately, the calculus is simple. Does the athletic department scrimp on $80,000 to just pull the plug next year, after allowing the current staff one final year to flounder? Or does it take some initiative and open a nationwide search as the national tournament winds down? I think we know a week from this Friday. If it is going to happen, May 22nd will be the day. If that day comes and goes without an announcement, we’re going to be in for quite year ahead.
Hold on to your butts.
