Fall ball was in full swing this weekend and one of the teams in actions was Notre Dame. The Fighting Irish played in the "Playing for Peace" tournament in Chicago and came away with victories over Detroit and Bellarmine. Oh, and they looked good doing it. 

The Boys from South Bend are coming off a 13-3 season in which they won the Big East regular season title and made it all the way to the Final Four. The team was led by its defense. Opponents managed only 6.31 goals-per-game and converted just 20% of their shots. John Kemp returns in the net for the Domers, but the defense isn't the only unit with returning stars.

The attack brings back Sean Rogers. He led the team with 22 goals as a junior last season. Rogers is great, but much of the talk has focused on the future of this unit. In other words, Matt Kavanagh. The guy is the top-ranked post grad player in the country and it's easy to see why.

Kavanagh left his mark on Team USA's U-19 team. He won the gold medal at the 2012 FIL Championships and was named tournament MVP. Kavanagh totaled 19 points in the competition. He looks to helps a team that managed only 8.62 goals-per-game. 

Guys like Rogers and Kavanagh may seem relatively small, but with a defense like Notre Dame's it can mean a lot. If this team can score as good as it stops shots, then another final four could be well on the way.

A week after the NLL draft, the Washington Stealth have already signed all seven of their selections to one-year contracts, according to the team. All the players will be invited to the team's training camp in two months. 

Washington picked defensemen Tyler Garrson (11th overall), Bill Hostrawser (12th), and Justin Pychel (19th) in the second round. The Stealth also took forward Mitch Jones (21st), defenseman Tim Henderson (23rd), transition player TJ Cowx (30th overall), and forward Kyle Buchanan (48th) with their other picks.

The training camp opens in early December. 40 players get invited to try out for the team, but only 23 make the active roster to start the season. Washington opens the season at home on January 5 against the reigning champion Rochester Knighthawks.

Fall ball is underway in college lax and teams are beginning to get a feel for who will replace some star players who have moved on. One of those teams is Princeton. The Tigers are doing something they haven't done in the last four years: look for a new goalie.

They haven't needed one because Tyler Fiorito was the man between the pipes for almost his entire career. He missed just one game during his time at Princeton and stopped nearly 200 more shots and than he let get past him. The netminder won Ivy League Player of the Year in 2012 and was a two-time All-American.

The 2013 team has three options to replace Fiorito: junior Brian Kavanagh, sophomore Eric Sanshagrin and freshman Matt O'Connor. Sanshagrin actually got a start last season. Against Manhattan, he allowed five goals, made eleven saves and got the win.

Overall, he appeared in five games and managed a 6.71 GAA. Kavanagh saw only fifteen minutes of action in 2012. He gave up three goals and made three saves in three games. Finally, O'Connor enters as the 67th best recruit according to Inside Lacrosse and saw a lot of time in the 'Play for Parkinson's' event this weekend.

I think it will be either Sanshagrin or O'Connor in the net come the start of the season. In a "gun to my head" situation, I'm going with O'Connor. The amount of time he  saw this weekend was huge and I think Princeton will want to continue the stability in net they had the last four years with Fiorito. 

The PLL is playing this season under strained circumstances. It has only three teams, but the future is looking up. Three franchises are in position to join the league next season. A fourth could be the Syracuse Stingers, located on the Onondaga Reservation, in central New York.

The team is led by captain Neal Powless and got its first taste of PLL action Saturday against the Charlotte Copperheads. Although Syracuse lost 18-10, it was an important first step for the franchise to join the league.

Another big step, of course,  is just having a guy like Powless around.  The veteran is no stranger to box lax. He's played for the Six Nations Chiefs of the MSL and the Rochester Knighthawks of the NLL. In fact, he wast part of the 'Hawks first championship team in 1997.

Not only is Powless a veteran of box lacrosse, he's from the Onondaga Nation. Lacrosse is huge in central New York and having a team that can be in a lacrosse hub is big for the PLL. As for the Stingers, keeping a local guy or two around can't hurt. Especially if they have Powless' resume. 

For the second straight week, the Jacksonville Bullies (3-1) and Reading Rockets (0-2) went to overtime. Again, Jax took the win. The Bullies scored the tying goal with less than a second to go in regulation and scored the lone overtime goal win 18-17.

Kiel Matisz led the way for Jacksonville with six goals, including the game-winner. The best individual performance belonged to Reading's Travis Bland, though. He finished with two goals and nine assists, his second straight week leading the Rockets in scoring.

Reading jumped out to an early lead in the first quarter, but went into the break down 6-5. Matisz and reigning PLL player of the week Andrew Kirkaldy scored five of the six goals for Jax. The Bullies expanded that lead in the second and went into the half up 11-8. 

Reading stepped up in the second half and took back the lead early in the fourth quarter. But Jacksonville had a comeback up its sleeve. With less than two minutes to play in regulation and the Bullies down 17-15, Junior Bucktooth scored a goal to bring Jax within one. Then, Shawn Wilkins tied the game with 0.4 seconds left on the clock to force overtime. Matisz buried the game-winner to get Jacksonville a third straight win.

Long Island acquired Colin Briggs and a pick in the 2013 supplemental draft from Denver in exchange for Zack Greer. In other words, one of the league's youngest team's just got younger.

Briggs was part of a trio of stars at Virginia that included Steele Stanwick and Chris Bocklett. He was third on the team in 2012 with 34 points and won the 2011 National Championship with the Cavaliers. He tallied five of the team's nine goals in the title match against Maryland. 

Briggs played in eight games this season with the Outlaws. He tallied six points (two goals, four assists) and now joins a midfield that includes Max Seibald and Stephen Peyser. He could be huge because of his ability to both score and distribute the ball. The Lizards had only two of the top twenty scorers in the league, but in Briggs there's potential for that number to increase next season.

That's not saying that he'll necessarily be the one putting up a ton of goals, but he's on a team with a lot of good young scorers in guys like Tommy Palasek and will only get more players like that once Rob Pannell joins the team next summer. Briggs is used to helping  big name players look good and I expect him to continue that in Long Island as that team continues to mature. 

While the Charlotte Copperheads (1-1) play the Syracuse Stingers in an exhibition in North Carolina tonight, the Jacksonville Bullies (2-1) face-off against the Reading Rockets (0-1) for the second straight week on Saturday. Here's what each team has to do for a win.

Reading

Get a Full Game From Travis Bland - You can't really criticize a guy that had four goals and earned the game's top star. But three of Bland's goals came in the first period. After that, he didn't score a goal until late in the third. Bland is clearly Reading's go-to scorer. The Rockets have to keep feeding him and let him go off all game.

Jacksonville

Get Kyle Hartzell Involved - Feed this man the ball. After putting up eight points (7 G, 1 A) in the first two games, Hartzell was held to two assists in week three. His team got the win, but Hartzell only had two assists. This guy is one of the most talented players in the league. Hartzell can put up big numbers and get Jax to a win every weekend.

Saturday's game starts at 7:30.

Buffalo had plenty of fantastic picks in the 2012 NLL Draft. The Bandits gained Dhane Smith, Hayden Smith and Jordan Critch. All three of those guys are fantastic players, but they weren't all the team got out of the night. There was another player that could make big waves in the league: Carter Bender.

Buffalo took Bender in the second round (18th overall). The team said on its website that it was surprised he was still available at this point. The higher-ups considered it a steal, and who can blame them?

Bender has plenty of experience. He's on Rochester in the MLL, but is probably better known for his work with the Brampton Excelsiors of the MSL. 2012 was his second season on the team. He joined towards the end of 2011, but didn't take long to get going. The Ontario native scored twice in the three games in the regular season and added four more goals in five  playoff games. Those are good, but the workload increased exponentially the next year.

In 2012, Bender was third on the Excelsiors in points with 25 (10 g, 15 a). That includes three games of four points or more. The postseason didn't go the way Bender or his teammates would've like, but once again he played well. He tacked on six goals and had a point in all but one game. That's good stuff.

Bender may not be the player that a Joe Resetarits or Kiel Matisz is, but he can stay play with the best of them. When trying to build a championship team, it never hurts to have a few Carter Benders around. 

(Photo Source: Bryon Johnson/The Brampton Guardian)

We can't say we didn't see this coming. The Big East wasn't about to let Syracuse host the 2013 conference lacrosse championship and then quietly off to the ACC. Why, you ask? Here are the three biggest reason the Carrier Dome isn't hosting the event.

3) It would be mad awks, bro-Seriously. The entire time the higher ups at both the Big East and Syracuse will have to talk about the move...and only the move. Not to mention, all the other coaches will have to talk about not playing in the Dome any longer. It wouldn't be very fun for anyone.

2) Loyalty-As much as we all say it's a business and that nothing lasts forever, it must be hard for the Big East not to take this personally. After all, the two had been together a long time and Villanova's sitting right there, not leaving the league. Loyalty is rewarded here. 

1) One Final "Screw You"-This one's sort of self-explanatory. This is the last chance for the league to stick it to the 'Cuse. It knew the school wanted to leave early and would pay big money to do it, so it had full control. The Big East got the money, but taking away the championship added some icing to the cake.

Is it a little vain for the Big East to take away the championship? Probably. I mean, break-ups are never easy. 

The Big East announced today that Villanova University will host the second Big East men's lacrosse tournament. It was originally supposed to be held in Syracuse, but the Orange lost it as part of its move to the ACC. Villanova hosted the inaugural conference tournament last May. 

The Big East also announced Georgetown as the host for the upcoming Big East women's lacrosse tournament. Both will take place on May 2 and 4, 2013.