Ten of the team's 13 games are against teams ranked in the preseason top 25.
Twenty-seven out of 38 players on the team are either freshmen or sophomores.
The starting goaltender has not played in a year.
The head coach is beginning only his second season at the helm.
The Penn men's lacrosse team has some real challenges in front of it as it begins the 2004 season, but head coach Brian Voelker feels confident that his team is more than up to the task.
Penn first hits the field with scrimmages against No. 14 Rutgers this Saturday and No. 10 Towson next Saturday. The unranked Quakers face one of the toughest schedules in the nation, including games at No. 2 Johns Hopkins to start the season and at No. 5 Maryland to end the season, with a game at Ivy League favorite, No. 4 Princeton, sandwiched in between.
But even if the Red and Blue do not shock the lacrosse world and beat all of these teams, Voelker believes that there is much to gain from competing at such a high level.
"I truly believe our program will benefit from playing [these teams]," Voelker said.
This year's group is a very young one, but is markedly deeper than last season's squad in several areas.
Last season, the midfield rotation consisted of only five or six players, including graduates Alex Kopicki and Jake Martin, steady contributors throughout their Penn careers.
"After the first five middies, we didn't really know what to do," Voelker said.
This season, however, there are nine midfielders expected to make significant contributions, which Voelker sites as a tremendous relief.
"If one guy's not doing it, we can move on to the next," he said.
The defense lost three starters from last year, and this year's starters are yet to be determined. While this unit is the least experienced of the Quakers, and is probably the weakest link, it has a solid man between the pipes in senior Ryan Kelly.
After missing last season due to academic reasons, Kelly returns to assume a large leadership role in net behind the young Penn defense.
"Every day I'm out here I try to be the biggest leader," Kelly said.
"We're expecting big things of him," Voelker said.
"Ryan is a guy that all these guys look to," he added.
On attack, the Quakers lost two players to graduation, but Voelker expects to have five or six players in the rotation this season. Junior Greg Voigt and senior tri-captain Will Phillips will lead the charge. Voelker referred to Phillips as "the most talented offensive player" and "the hardest worker" on the team.
Phillips hopes to set the example for the rest of the Quakers to follow.
"We play a lot of tough teams," he said. "I think our edge is to be a harder working team ... that's going to go in and push people around."
Despite the potential pitfalls in front of them, the Quakers have an overwhelmingly positive attitude.
"We are going to go into every game feeling like we're going to win it," Voelker said.
Kelly felt even stronger about the team's outlook.
The senior summed up the team's goal in three words, "win every game.
"If that's not your attitude, you probably don't belong playing."
