Mac O’Keefe Left Out Of Inside Lacrosse’s Preseason All-Big Ten Team
Inside Lacrosse released its annual Face-Off Yearbook last week, and one name was notably missing from its list of preseason All-Big Ten players: Mac O’Keefe.
Last season, O’Keefe was a breakout star for the Nittany Lions. The season looked promising, but the immense success the team found was a surprise. A big reason for the program’s resurgence last season was the addition of O’Keefe, who was a freshman at the time. The attackman burst onto the scene in his first collegiate game with seven goals against Robert Morris. Three weeks later, he scored eight times against Villanova.
By the end of the season, O’Keefe had tallied 51 goals and a total of 56 points, which was good for the seventh-best point total of any player in the Big Ten. Two of the names above him in the point rankings were his own teammates — former captain Nick Aponte and current junior Grant Ament. Ament, on the other hand, made it onto Inside Lacrosse’s preseason All-Big Ten list.
O’Keefe’s 51 goals also broke a 60-year Penn State record from 1957 for most goals in a single season. The previous record of 49 goals was held by Bill Hess. And O’Keefe’s freshman season goal total was good for fourth-best in Big Ten history.
Despite O’Keefe’s record-breaking freshman season, it seems the 2017 Big Ten goal leader will have to remind people of his knack for finding the back of the net in his upcoming sophomore campaign.
Your ad blocker is on.
Please choose an option below.
Purchase a Subscription!