Mercer University is a school which dates back to 1833, when it was founded as the Mercer Institute, named after a prominent Baptist leader named James Mercer.
The women’s lacrosse team at the school, started in 2015, has had modes success, winning six conference championships, including all the ones on offer from 2018 to the present. Mercer, however, has never won an NCAA Tournament game; its closest outing was a 13-9 first-round loss to Wagner in 2018.
I guess it is a product of expectations that the score that has jumped out at me the most thus far in the NCAA women’s lacrosse season was when Mercer topped Clemson 11-10.
This is a Clemson program which has been building on incremental blocks — the coaching staff, the initial recruiting class, the first set of transfers, and getting some “name” recruits such as Alexa Spallina, the No. 1 recruit from the 2025 graduating class. She had recommitted from Syracuse last June to join up with Clemson, and with that, will come some unrealistic expectations for the Tigers.
So, it wasn’t next year’s team that Mercer was able to beat thanks to its play in the dying minutes of regulation, but this year’s team. Still, it is a not insignificant victory. Mercer plays in the Big South Conference, while Clemson competes in the strong Atlantic Coast Conference.
Caroline Glus was the Bears’ heroine early, scoring four goals in under seven minutes in the first quarter. But it was goalie Kayla Casey — and a goalpost — who were able to keep Clemson at bay.
Casey is an interesting story; she did not play her first three years on campus because of COVID and a crowded goalie room. She played in nine games in each of her first two seasons, playing slightly short of seven full games’ worth of minutes. This year, was splitting time for much of the season. But against Clemson, she played the entire game, saving 54.5 percent of the shots she faced.
Now, I’m not sure that Mercer is going to be one of those world beaters in the burgeoning world of mid-major teams in the world of women’s lacrosse. But anything is possible; remember when Vanderbilt made the Final Four in the early 2000s?