SOUTH BEND, Ind. – Fresh off back-to-back national titles, No. 1/1 Notre Dame opens up the 2025 season against Cleveland State at 6 p.m. ET on Wednesday, Feb. 12 inside Loftus Sports Center. The game will be broadcast live on ACCNX.
GAME DETAILS
Location: South Bend, Indiana | Loftus Sports Center
Schedule: February 12 — 6 p.m. ET
Live Stream: ACCNX
Live Stats: FightingIrish.com
Twitter Updates: @NDlacrosse
For a more in-depth look at the matchup – Game Notes: Notre Dame
THE CLEVELAND STATE SERIES
• Wednesday will be the fifth meeting all time between Notre Dame and Cleveland State.
• The Irish hold a 4-0 lead in the series.
• Notre Dame won the most recent matchup by a score of 25-3 on Feb. 14, 2024 inside Loftus.
• The starting attack of Jake Taylor (5G), Chris Kavanagh (3G, 2A) and Pat Kavanagh (5A) each posted five points in the victory. Fourteen different Notre Dame players scored at least one goal to complete the dominant performance.
OWNING THE OPENERS
• Notre Dame is 37-7 all-time in season openers, including a 31-5 record in the Kevin Corrigan era.
• The Irish have won a program-record 22 straight season openers.
• Notre Dame opened the 2024 season with a 25-3 win over Cleveland State on Feb. 14.
• The Irish last dropped a season opener in 2002, a 10-9 overtime setback at home against Penn State.
• In home openers, the Irish are 40-4 in program history and 33-3 under Corrigan.
FANTASTIC FEBRUARYS FOR THE FIGHTING IRISH
• Notre Dame is 37-5 in its last 42 games played in February dating back to the 2006 season.
• Fighting Irish head coach Kevin Corrigan is 46-8 in the month of February during his Notre Dame tenure.
KAVANAGH LEADS THE ATTACK
• Chris Kavanagh turned in the greatest statistical offensive season in Notre Dame history last year, setting the program record for points in a season with 81.
• The attackman totaled 44 goals and 37 assists during the 2024 season.
• Chris joined his brothers Matt (42G, 33A – 2015) and Pat (31G, 49A – 2024) as the only players in program history to record 30+ goals and assists in the same season.
• The Rockville Centre native earned NCAA Championship Most Outstanding Player honors after a prolific four-game stretch in the tournament in 2024, recording 22 points off 14 goals and 8 assists.
• The attackman put an exclamation mark on his season with a 5-goal performance in the national title win over Maryland, tying the program record for goals in an NCAA tournament game.
• Kavanagh set the program record for points in an NCAA Tournament game against Georgetown in the quarterfinals, totaling eight points off five goals and three assists. The five goals tied the program record for most goals scored in an NCAA Tourney game.
• With four points (1G, 3A) in the ACC semifinal win over No. 5 UVA, Chris broke into the top 10 on Notre Dame’s career scoring list. The junior has 176 points off 112 goals and 64 assists and currently ranks seventh in program history.
•The senior not only paced Notre Dame’s offense in 2023 but his 46 goals ranked third all-time in program history for a single season, just three behind Randy Colley’s record of 49 goals set in 1995.
• Chris finished with 10 hat tricks during the 2023 campaign and has 15 in his career.
• The Rockville Centre, New York, native has 112 career goals, ranking eighth in program history.
LYGHTS OUT
• It didn’t take long for Shawn Lyght to make a name for himself in the college lacrosse world, as he cemented himself as one of the top cover defenseman in the country during his 2024 freshman season.
• Lyght consistently drew the No. 1 option for the opposing attack throughout the season.
• The defenseman held Connor Shellenberger to just one goal between the two matchups, both resulting in wins and he limited Joey Spallina to just one point in their only matchup of the year.
• Lyght was the only sophmore to earn first team All-America status in the Inside Lacrosse preseason honors.
DOMINATING THE DOT
• Will Lynch is coming off his best season in his Fighting Irish career, winning 61.2 percent of his faceoff attempts to lead the ACC and rank fourth in the country.
• The FOGO won 202-of 330 attempts and scooped up a team-high 113 ground balls.
• Over the four NCAA Tournament games Lynch was even better than his season average, winning 63-of-97 (64.9%).
• Lynch added a career-high four goals last season, including one in the ACC Tournament and one in the NCAA Tournament.
• Lynch was named to the All-ACC Team and to the ACC All-Tournament Team.
• The standout won over 50 percent of faceoffs in 12-of-16 games last season.
LOCKDOWN DEFENSE
• The Irish finished 2024 allowing just 8.94 goals per game, leading the country, despite playing six games against opponents that ranked in the top 15 in goals scored per game.
• Notre Dame held opponents to 10 or fewer goals in 12 of 17 games during the 2024 campaign, including seven of the last eight on the way to the title.
• The Irish limited the opposition to 12 or fewer goals in 16 of 17 outings last season.
• Preseason All-Americans Ben Ramsey, Will Donovan and Shawn Lyght each return to the defensive unit.
THE ATTACK IS BACK
• The Irish return a lot of firepower from the 2024 roster that claimed the national title, as seven of the top 10 scorers from last year are back in 2025.
• Notre Dame brings back 71.8 percent of its goals (191/266) from last season’s production.
• Five players who recorded 10+ goals last season are back, which include Chris Kavanagh (44), Jake Taylor (41), Devon McLane (37), Jordan Faison (22) and Max Busenkell (11).
PRESEASON ACCOLADES
• Notre Dame has racked up the recognitions prior to the start of the 2025 season.
• The Fighting Irish have four players on the Tewaaraton Watch List (Kavanagh, Lyght, Ramsey and Taylor), more than any other team in the country.
• Nine ND players earned preseason Inside Lacrosse All-America citations, the most in the nation.
• The Irish spread six players over the two USILA Preseason All-America teams, the most of any team.
• Notre Dame had five players on the Preseason All-ACC Team as voted on by the league’s coaches, the most of the five teams in the conference.
CASHING IN ON THE EMO
• Notre Dame’s extra-man unit was one of the greatest in the history of college lacrosse in 2024, leading the country with a mark of 67.5 percent.
• The unit found the back of the net on 27-of-40 attempts over the course of the season.
• The 67.5 percentage was the highest in a decade, as the last team to have a better percentage was Detroit Mercy’s mark of 70.8 percent during the 2014 season.
• The Irish have finished in the top five in the country for man-up offense in each of the last four seasons.
• Devon McLane and Jeffery Ricciardelli paced the Irish EMO with seven goals apiece during the 2024 campaign.
FROM THE GRIDIRON TO THE LACROSSE FIELD
• Three Notre Dame lacrosse players on the 2025 squad also suited up for the football team in the fall, as Jordan Faison, Tyler Buchner and Matt Jeffery are both dual-sport athletes.
• Faison finished the season with 30 receptions for 356 yards and a TD, including a seven-catch, 89-yard performance in the first round of the College Football Playoff win against IU.
• Buchner was used in trick plays on special teams, picking up a first down on a fake FG against GT and completing a 23-yard pass on a fake punt against USC.
• Jeffery played in three games on special teams during his freshman season, seeing the field against Purdue, Stanford and Navy.
IRISH INDOORS
• Notre Dame has excelled when playing inside the last nine seasons, going 19-1 when playing indoors since the start of the 2015 season.
• Notre Dame is currently riding a 23-game win streak when playing in Loftus Sports Center.
• The Irish haven’t lost in Loftus Sports Center since dropping a 14-11 decision to UNC on March 14, 2004.
• The Irish went 2-0 when playing indoors last season, defeating Cleveland State in the home opener in Loftus and then downing Marquette inside the Marquette Dome.
CORRIGAN ALL-TIME DI PROGRAM WINS LEADER
• With the win over No. 1 Duke on April 10, 2021, Baumer Family Head Men’s Lacrosse Coach Kevin Corrigan broke the NCAA record for most wins at a DI program with 311, passing Bob Shillinglaw (Delaware).
• Corrigan became just the third coach in NCAA Division I men’s lacrosse history to reach the 300-win mark at a single school with the win over Marquette on April 10, 2019.
• Corrigan is one of just four active Division I coaches to reach the 300-win mark in his career.
• Corrigan has an overall record of 361-175 in his 39 seasons of coaching.
• The head coach is 351-160 in his 37 seasons at Notre Dame.
• Corrigan is the longest tenured men’s lacrosse coach at the DI level.