No. 2-seed Maryland men’s lacrosse head coach John Tillman tends to avoid playing Cornell as much as he can.
Tillman grew up in Corning, New York, just under an hour away from Cornell’s campus. Long before he was a coach, he was a college lacrosse player for the Big Red, a defensive midfielder that earned a varsity letter with the team in his senior season.
The ties run deep between the coach and the programs. Tillman’s head coach at Cornell, Richie Moran, was a Maryland alum. The teams have met three times in the title game — of just 19 all-time contests — with Maryland winning in 2022 but losing in 1971 and 1976.