Video Review, Budgets, Exposure All Factor into Neutral Site College Games

The internet was buzzing after North Carolina slipped by Penn State, 10-8, in the Crown Lacrosse Classic on March 14.

Most of the chat wasn’t about a high-quality, top-10 matchup bringing the game to a neutral site in a less traditional lacrosse area.

Instead, it was focused on a video review at American Legion Memorial Stadium in Charlotte, N.C. When Penn State challenged that North Carolina committed a crease violation before Dom Pietramala’s early fourth-quarter goal put the Heels up 8-6, online viewers heard Corrigan Sports Network play-by-play announcer Booker Corrigan say: “Booker Corrigan is the video review guy now.”

Prior to the game, the officials had informed both teams’ coaching staffs and Corrigan Sports Network that in the case of a review, they’d be using the platform’s streaming feed for replay. But listeners of the review interpreted that Corrigan was doing the actual assessment of the challenge, not the officials.

“When they said, ‘You’re the review,’ they meant our film,” Corrigan said.

Corrigan has since explained that he was only acting as a go-between. He was communicating by walkie-talkie with the unseen official under the tent and then relaying to the broadcast truck what replays and angles the official needed.

All the while, his broadcast mic was on, giving fans an inside listen to everything he was thinking aloud to his analyst.

“Next time it happens,” Corrigan said, “we’re gonna go to commercial.”

Penn State lost the challenge with the call on the field upheld by review, and with fans reacting to what they had heard from Corrigan, both the NCAA and Corrigan Sports felt compelled to address their concerns.

Both issued statements denying that Corrigan had an active role in the review decision.

“The review was undertaken, in accordance with the rules, by the game officials only, with a monitor at the scorer’s table on the field, and the subsequent ruling was made by the game officials only without any outside input,” the NCAA statement said.

North Carolina coach Joe Breschi confirmed the review arrangements were agreed upon before the game in which Penn State served as the home team. Penn State could not be reached for comment. Agreeing on a review system is standard practice before a neutral site game.

“The discussions that were had were, we’re going to use the television version as opposed to ScoreBreak to determine any situation that may arise that is for review,” Breschi said. “So that was discussed, and there was a plan in place. Nothing was out of the ordinary.”

It marked another controversial replay for Penn State. The NCAA implemented video replay for 2024 after a no-call on a Duke goal in Penn State’s 16-15 NCAA semifinal loss in 2023.

Then last year, officials missed an apparent goal from Penn State in a loss to Ohio State even after using replay. Though Saturday’s review against UNC was adjudicated correctly, it also raised questions about neutral site logistics, though video review capability is not a high concern for many coaches.

“It’s not an issue that’s specific to neutral sites games,” Harvard coach Gerry Byrne said. “If you know it’s not great when you’re home or away on a campus, you know now you’re one step removed and you’re playing at a neutral site, the neutral site operator — you can presume — is not going to be as good as what you think you have on your home or away campuses.”

For Byrne and many coaches, the opportunities far outweigh any such issues. The Crimson have played two neutral site games this season. They visited a lacrosse hotbed when they played Marquette at Chaminade (N.Y). They went to a less traditional spot when they played Michigan at Kinkaid School (Texas), then after the win visited the Houston rodeo as a team.

“If I can only be on the field for two hours, there’s another 22 hours of the day,” Byrne said. “And how can I use that to help my guys get jobs and see parts of the world or parts of the country that they’ve never been to?”

Harvard will play a third neutral-site game at Archbishop Spalding (Md.) against North Carolina on Sunday. Byrne hasn’t thrown a challenge flag yet this season because there has been such a low rate of call reversals, and he doesn’t want to lose a precious timeout.

It doesn’t help that there’s no standard for replay equipment and the quality varies greatly site to site. Officials told both teams before their game at Chaminade that replay quality would be “iffy on goal line and crease” challenges, Byrne said. And there was no replay available at Kinkaid.

“It couldn’t be set up,” Byrne said. “They tried. They couldn’t coordinate it.”

There is another concern for Lacrosse Day in Chicago on April 4 in which current men’s No. 1 Notre Dame is set to take on No. 2 Richmond at Northwestern’s Martin Stadium overlooking Lake Michigan. There’s no broadcaster for the game as of now, though Notre Dame coach Kevin Corrigan said last Thursday the teams were “getting close.”

Even if only those in the Chicago area travel to the venue that will host this year’s women’s final four to see the showdown, he sees plenty of upside.

“They’re great events for the communities where they’re played,” Kevin Corrigan said. “They’re great events for the kids who get the opportunity to play in them and to travel to different areas of the country to play where they normally wouldn’t. It's a great thing for our game. And I’m glad more people are doing it.”

One Division I coach who asked not to go on record said they didn’t want to play on high school fields, but teams are increasingly playing neutral site games in a variety venues and areas. While UNC and Penn State were playing in Charlotte, Duke was topping Providence 21-5 at Howitt Middle School on Long Island. Penn will face UMass there in a month.

“Last week for us was really a grassroots kind of thing where, it’s right in the middle of the town, autographs after the game, tons of young aspiring, lacrosse players,” Duke coach John Danowski said. “It had a real community feel to it. Certainly, there are a lot of reasons for doing it.”

Duke will return to Long Island on April 11 to play Cornell at LIU. During last year’s NCAA championship season, the Big Red played Syracuse at Nassau County Community College. Cornell considers several factors when it gets a neutral site proposal.

“What time we can play, what the venue can hold, how the experience will be, because I think that’s the nice part is if we go someplace, the hope is that it’s a good crowd, it’s a cool venue, it’s a good opportunity to play in a neutral site, knowing that when you get to the playoffs, a lot of times you’re in a neutral site,” Cornell coach Connor Buczek said. “And so hopefully the environment creates a good game day environment.”

Florida’s women played Clemson at Milton (Ga.) on Feb. 21 due to a Clemson travel limitation. The teams didn’t want to miss out on the game, so they sought a neutral site that was drivable for Clemson and were ecstatic that the powerhouse Georgia high school was willing to host.

It drew a huge enthusiastic crowd for the one-goal thriller.

“You look in the stands, and you see the families and the little girls and then you realize, ‘Wow, this is truly growing the game,’ which is important as well,” Florida coach Amanda O’Leary said.

For the Penn and Georgetown women, a weekday meeting made more sense at neutral USA Lacrosse headquarters. Splitting the responsibilities and some cost of equipment and field staffing added up to less cost than putting a team up in a hotel.

“We can make it a weekday game that is up and back versus an overnight,” Penn coach Karin Brower said. “That’s one reason why we did it.”

The financial piece has become a huge consideration with budgets tighter than ever. Some in-conference road trips can’t be avoided, but other matchups require more creativity and even a little extra work on the logistics of a neutral site.

“If you’re going back to a reciprocal place, then there’s a lot of familiarity with it,” O’Leary said. “Colleges have lots of food options, lots of hotels. When you go to a neutral site, you’re going to have to do your homework.”

It helps that neutral site games are common enough that many of the game day logistics are now taken care of by event organizers. Meeting at a neutral site can allow teams to bus to a game rather than more expensive flights. Add in some financial help often offered from event organizers and coaches say they can cut two-thirds off a trip expense while making important inroads at the same time.

“I’m very conscious about that piece, but also the recruiting is huge,” Breschi said. “I think you’re just trying to build your brand and put your brand out there in different areas of the country that lacrosse is being played.”

UNC is in talks with Army to play in California in a future season. It would be a significant road trip for both, but it follows a line of thinking that is catching on with more coaches who are seeing if they can bring high level play to new crowds and help raise the visibility of the sport while being budget conscious.

“We’ve done these all over the place,” Kevin Corrigan said. “That’s part of that experience. It is traveling, and there’s no two ways around that, but there are a lot of different benefits that you get from it.”