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CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. – The No. 1 Virginia Cavaliers (9-0) begin Atlantic Coast Conference play on Saturday, visiting Byrd Stadium in College Park, Md., to battle the No. 4 Maryland Terrapins (6-1). Faceoff is slated for 8 p.m. and live stats will be available at VirginiaSports.com. For the fourth-straight week, UVa graces the No. 1 position in both the Nike/Inside Lacrosse media and USILA coaches polls.

The game will be broadcast in the Charlottesville area on WINA AM 1070 with John Freeman calling the action and Doug Tarring doing the color broadcast. ESPNU will televise the contest in HD with Carter Blackburn providing the play-by-play, while Quint Kessenich and Matt Striebel will serve as the color analysts.

Saturday marks the 62nd-straight season the Cavaliers and the Terrapins have clashed in an all-time series that began in 1926. Only Virginia’s 64-straight regular seasons playing Johns Hopkins is a longer consecutively played series.

Maryland narrowly holds the all-time advantage with a 44-39 mark, however Virginia has won seven of the last eight meetings, including last year’s seven overtime triumph. The Cavaliers’ 11-10 victory set a record at the NCAA Division I level for the longest game ever. Steele Stanwick led the way with four goals for the Cavaliers and Brian Carroll scored the game-clinching goal in the seventh overtime.

As Virginia opens up ACC play, the other league schools have completed their conference schedule except for playing Virginia. Virginia is 42-14 all-time in ACC openers and 20-8 when opening league play away from Charlottesville, Va.

Virginia has started the season with nine-straight wins for the third-consecutive season after defeating No. 12 Johns Hopkins on March 27, 15-6. Rhamel and Shamel Bratton, along with Matt White each scored three goals to pace the UVa attack. Shamel Bratton added two assists, while Adam Ghitelman saved 10 shots and Ken Clausen picked up a game-high six ground balls.

Chris Bocklet leads Virginia with 26 goals and 35 points on the season, while Stanwick holds the team lead with 18 assists. Carroll and Rhamel Bratton are tied for second on the team with 15 goals, while Stanwick has 12 goals and 18 assists for 30 points, which is second best on the squad. Freshman Matt White has 12 goals and has tallied at least one point in every game of his young collegiate career. Clausen has a team-best 35 ground balls and his 2.67 caused turnovers per game ranks No. 2 nationally. Ghitelman is saving 55.7 percent of the shots against him, while posting a 7.36 goals-against average.

Maryland head coach Dave Cottle is in his ninth year at Maryland and returns 28 letterwinners and seven starters off of last year’s 10-7 squad that lost to eventual national champion Syracuse in the NCAA quarterfinals. The Terripans remained at No. 4 in both the media and coaches poll after a narrow setback, 9-7, in Chapel Hill, N.C., against the No. 2 North Carolina Tar Heels on March 27.

Grant Catalino leads the attack for Maryland with team highs of 15 goals, 16 assists and 31 points. Ryan Young has added eight goals and 12 assists for 20 points, all marks are second-best on the squad. Rounding out the top scorers for the Terrapins are Jake Bernhardt, Travis Reed, Adam Sear and Will Yeatman who all have seven goals. Reed has chipped in eight assists for a team’s third-best 15 points. Bryn Holmes has picked up a team-high 36 ground balls and Brian Phipps is saving 52.0 percent of shot attempts between the pipes. Phipps also has a 8.63 goals-against average.

Virginia continues ACC play on Saturday, April 10, when the Cavaliers open up the New Meadowlands in the Konica Minolta Big City Classic against No. 2 North Carolina. Game time is 4 p.m. and it will be broadcast in the Charlottesville area on WINA AM 1070 with John Freeman calling the action. The contest will be televised live on ESPNU.

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