UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. – The Penn State men's lacrosse team saw three student-athletes earn weekly honors after a successful weekend at the Crown Lacrosse Classic in Charlotte, N.C., where the Nittany Lions went 2-0 with wins over then-No. 3 Cornell and Jacksonville.
Redshirt junior Grant Ament was named the Warrior/US Lacrosse National Player of the Week, the Big Ten Offensive Player of the Week, and earned a spot on the USILA Team of the Week after a two goal, 17 assist weekend.
Against Cornell, Ament did something that has not been done by a Nittany Lion since 1983. The Doylestown, Pa., native, dished out a personal-best nine assists which tied the single game school record set by Gary Martin in 1983.
He followed it up with a tied-career-high performance at Jacksonville. The attackman scored two goals and dished out eight assists to tie his career high with 10 points. Ament now has four of the top-5 single game assist performances in the NCAA Division I Lacrosse in 2019. Ament also broke the Penn State single season assist record of 44 set by both Gary Martin (1982) and Jeff Connor (1988). Ament is now at 46 on the season, and 110 career assists, good for second all-time, trailing only Martin who recorded 156 from 1981-84.
Ament currently leads the nation in assists per game at 6.57 as well as points per game at 8.00.
This marks Ament's second Big Ten Offensive Player of the Week award of the season, and the third of his career (2/22/17, 2/5/19, 3/12/19). This is the third time in his career that Ament has earned a national player of the week honor. In 2017, Ament earned both the Alpha Lacrosse/ Inside Lacrosse National Player of the Week and the USILA/BSN Sports D1 Player of the Week on February 22. This is his second USILA Team of the Week honor of the season.
Junior Gerard Arceri was named the Big Ten Specialist of the Week for the first time this season after a 40-54 weekend at the 'x' that included 27 groundballs and an assist.
Against Cornell, Arceri went 25-36 at the x and scooped up 18 groundballs. His 25 faceoff wins was a new personal best, and his 18 groundballs tied his career-high. Against Jacksonville, the St. James, N.Y., native, went 15-18 at the 'x', with nine groundballs and an assist in just half the game.
Arceri became the Penn State record holder for career faceoff wins with 511, he now sits at 512 for his career after the Jacksonville game. Starting Sunday at third on the all-time list, Arceri passed both second-place Greg Gurenlian (508; 2003-06) and first-place Danny Henneghan (510; 2010-13), to take sole possession of the top.
Arceri has now won a career total of nine Big Ten Specialist of the Week honors (2/14/17, 3/8/17, 2/20/18, 2/27/18, 3/6/18, 3/13/18, 3/20/18, 4/17/18, 3/12/19).
Freshman TJ Malone earned his third Big Ten Freshman of the Week honor of the season, making him the only Big Ten freshman to earn the award on multiple occasions.
Malone finished the weekend with seven goals, one assist and six groundballs. Against Cornell, he kept his seven-game point streak alive with an assist and followed it up with a break out performance against Jacksonville. Against the Dolphins, Malone scored a career-high seven goals and scooped up a personal best six groundballs to help the Nittany Lions to victory. Malone is currently fifth in the nation in both shot percentage (.607) and man up goals (4).
Penn State gets a week off before heading to Cleveland State on Saturday, March 23 for a 12:30 p.m. ET first face in Cleveland, Ohio.
