After being sent home by Penn in the second round of last year’s NCAA tournament, No. 3-seed Maryland women’s lacrosse knew it needed to bring in a firestarter on offense. That spark came in the form of the Quakers’ best attacker.
Maryland
No. 3-seed Maryland women’s lacrosse fends off Rutgers, 11-8, in NCAA Tournament second round
Penn transfer Keeley Block’s two late goals closed the door on Rutgers Sunday, capping her four-goal performance and driving the Terps into the very quarterfinal round she denied them from in 2025.
“I just really don’t think when I shoot,” Block said. “So maybe I just didn’t think a lot.”
In a Big Ten rematch, the Terps never relinquished their lead, advancing with an 11-8 win over the Scarlet Knights.
The first quarter mirrored Maryland’s regular-season contest against Rutgers as the Terps scored four goals in the first eight minutes of the contest. Lauren LaPointe notched the latter two goals within 28 seconds of each other, settling into her spot on the left elbow with ease.
Rutgers found a footing and netted its opening goal with six minutes to go in the opening frame, but the Terps’ response came just 37 seconds later. LaPointe spotted a cutting Block deep in the fan and shuttled a high pass for Block to immediately jam into the back of the net.
LaPointe capped her dominant opening frame by finding another cutter in Maisy Clevinger with seconds remaining. Clevinger buried her ninth goal of the season to give the Terps a five-goal advantage.
“As we move forward in this tournament, the good thing about having a balanced offense is you really need everybody to step up for us to be successful,” head coach Cathy Reese said. “Everybody needs to do their part.”
A massive component of Maryland’s early dominance was the performance of Kayla Gilmore. The sophomore helped the Terps take the first eight draw controls of the contest, avenging her 19-12 defeat in the circle the last time these teams played.
After the Terps eventually lost a draw — over 20 minutes into the contest — the scoring began to even out. Rutgers’ Hilary Elsner and Caroline Ling sandwiched a Kori Edmondson free position goal, and Alex Popham hit a low-angle snipe with four minutes left in the half to cut the Maryland lead to three.
After a brief lull, Clevinger scored again with just 73 seconds left in the first half. Jordyn Lipkin’s assist on the score marked her second of the contest, as Maryland notched seven first half set-ups. Three different Terps had multiple assists Sunday.
But the Scarlet Knights grabbed assists of their own, scoring off indirect free positions from the left elbow three times in the second frame. The last of those scores came from Kate Theofield, who stunned JJ Suriano with just seven seconds before the halftime horn sounded. The Terps’ netminder was far more active in the second quarter, facing eight more shots than she did in the first and conceding on four of them.
While Maryland’s offense perfectly replicated its first half from its last meeting against Rutgers, its defense suffered from occasional mental lapses. Six first-half fouls from the Terps gave the Scarlet Knights easy opportunities, and Suriano looked particularly vulnerable against shots from the wing.
Maryland’s defense continued to struggle after the break despite four Suriano saves in the first eight minutes of the second half. The Terps let up another easy goal to Ling before Edmondson and Popham traded scores.
At the close of the period, Maryland finally pieced together another run through the stick of Block. She blasted off the line on an 8-meter chance, finding nylon for her eighth hat trick of the year. Then, after committing a yellow card infraction early in the fourth quarter, Block stormed back onto the field and scored almost immediately.
That goal proved to be the dagger, securing the Terps’ return to the quarterfinals. Despite scoring just three goals in the final 30 minutes — none of which were assisted — Maryland’s defense found the stops it needed to keep the season alive.
1. Suriano’s presence. After a dominant performance in Maryland’s narrow Big Ten championship loss, the junior maintained her form Sunday. Suriano’s 10 saves and 55.6% save percentage demonstrated a reliable presence for the Terps between the posts,, what Reese described as “JJ doing JJ things.”
“I think high pressure situations are more fun,” Suriano said “And I find the joy in being out there with my teammates, doing what I love.”
2. The ground ball battle. It has been a rare sight in 2026 to see Maryland outdo its opponent in ground balls. But against Rutgers, the Terps dominated, corralling 15 of the 25 total ground balls, with Suriano and Kristen Shanahan combining for seven.
3. Painting the frame. With a respectable 24 total shots, Maryland needed to be highly accurate to maintain its advantage. The Terps succeeded, shooting 87.5% of their shots on goal and completely overwhelming Scarlet Knight goalkeeper Stella Quilty.
Baltimore Sun co-owner Armstrong Williams held a town hall to discuss juvenile justice in Maryland.
Williams was joined by a panel featuring DJS Chair Betsy Tolentino, City State’s Attorney Ivan Bates, and Todd Scott, the founder of ‘We Rise.’
There was also a studio audience of teen “success stories.”
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You can watch the full Town Hall above.
BALTIMORE COUNTY, MD — Maryland State Del. Nino Mangione was picked over the weekend to serve as the County Council’s newest member.
The move came Saturday, when the two-person Baltimore County Republican Central Committee held a public hearing and a vote at the Holiday Inn Timonium.
Mangione was one of seven candidates vying to fill the 3rd District seat left vacant in May by Councilman Wade Kach, who resigned due to health issues after serving on the County Council for more than 11 years.
Other candidates who competed for the 3rd District seat included Todd Huff, Lynne Jones, Tim Braue, Eric Rockel, Gerard Wittstadt, and E.J. McNulty.
Mangione was the only figure who simultaneously ran for a council seat in this year’s election bid. He is also running as a 5th District candidate, which includes most of the current 3rd District.
The county is operating under a new redistricting map that was approved for the 2026 election cycle last year. The map was passed in a 5-2 vote.
Baltimore County will hold its primary election on June 23.
MARYLAND (WBFF) — Starting Monday, June 1st, marks the first day mail-in ballots across the state will be canvassed for the 2026 primary elections, as local boards of election officials can begin the process of opening, reviewing, and counting the mail-in ballots already received.
Just last week, the Maryland State Board of Elections began sending out replacement mail-in ballots after an error assigned hundreds of thousands of residents to the wrong political party.
ALSO READ | Maryland State Board of Elections starts sending out corrected mail-in ballots after error
The Board of Elections has pointed the finger at its vendor, Taylor Print and Visual Impressions, Inc., for this error, but members of Congress and political analysts say more answers are needed on how this happened.
“A mail-in ballot error like this only leads to people getting into more conspiracy theories, election rigging, back to the 2020 talk all over again,” said Political analyst John Dedie.
Just a few days ago, FOX News Digital posted an interview with Maryland’s Lieutenant Governor, asking for a response to President Donald Trump’s calls for the Department of Justice to investigate the state’s mail-in ballots.
ALSO READ | Maryland Freedom Caucus calls mail-in ballot error a crisis, urges federal audit of rolls
“The administration is a separate body from the board of elections,” said Maryland Lt. Governor Aruna Miller. “It happens, sometimes Ballots get mailed the wrong way. It happens almost in every election. So we’ll see what the investigation shows…I don’t think it was in malice, in any bad way that this happened. I think it was just error by the vendor.”
Meanwhile, at the latest Maryland State Board of Elections meeting, Maryland State Board of Elections Administrator Jared DeMarinis answered questions from board members if an outer investigation will take place following the election.
“We always do a lessons learned after every election,” said DeMarinis. “And this will be a part of our lessons learned, and we will, of course, be working with you know and getting more you know information about how to prevent this in the future, with it.”
DeMarinis adding…”we’ve been open and transparent about it. I don’t necessarily know what more of an investigation would shed light on.”
According to the Board, more than 500,000 voters requested mail-in ballots.
Without being able to identify who received the wrong party ballot, the board says all mail-in voters were sent replacements.
The Board is urging all voters to vote with the replacement ballot, adding safe guards are in place to ensure voting will not happen.
Since this error, a Congressional committee has reached out to the Board requesting a response by June 9th.
ALSO READ | Congressional committee members want answers about Maryland’s mail-in ballot mistake
FOX45 spoke with Republican Congressman Morgan Griffith of Virginia. Griffith said, “We will be keeping an eye on it because we have concerns we want to make sure that the federal elections, state folks can do whatever in the state or local elections, but in the federal elections it’s our job to make sure that voters are getting an opportunity to vote that they’re not being disenfranchised by some accident or intentional act.”
Political analysts also tell FOX45 that more answers are needed to ensure voter confidence.
“There needs to be more answers and possibly a hearing on this,” said Dedie. “Not wait till next year when they’re back in Annapolis after the election.
For now, anyone who has questions on this error and the next steps, the Board is urging you to contact them or go to their website.
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