The most underrated position in lacrosse

For decades, pro offenses have been built around attacking two players: the two short-stick defensive midfielders. Teams will pick and re-pick to switch a short stick onto their best player. And when they get the switch, they isolate. Inverts against short-stick defenders have been instant, “just add water” offense.

Not in 2025. It’s tougher than ever to score one-on-one against an SSDM.

Today’s SSDMs are not converted offensive midfielders who couldn’t cut it on that side of the ball; they are specially trained in their craft. They aren’t defenders who don’t have a long pole; they’re defenders who don’t need a long pole.

Shooting percentage when unassisted against a short stick was 20.7% across the league this season — the lowest since the league began tracking the closest defender in 2023. Against unassisted shots, SSDMs have been tougher than long poles in 2025. A position previously perceived as a mismatch has now become an offense’s worst nightmare.

To be fair, short sticks are normally guarding the two worst offensive players on the field. Shots taken against them are further from the net, and only 27.0% of those shots are assisted, much less than 52.1% of shots taken against long poles.

But even when controlling for unassisted shots, players shot 22.5% against poles, almost two points better than against short sticks.

When broken down to the player-by-player level, defensive midfielders are still excelling more than ever. Eight of the top 10 players in shooting percentage against this season are short sticks. Only five cracked the top 10 in 2024, and only three the year before.

All four finalists for the George Boiardi Hard Hat Award – given to the league’s top SSDM – are playing in the PLL semifinals on Monday: Danny Logan (New York), Dylan Hess (Philadelphia), Brian Tevlin (California), and Ryan Terefenko (Denver). Each dominates on-ball — and does a bit of something else to contribute to winning. Here’s what makes each finalist a face of the modern-day SSDM:

The Most Feared Defender in the World: Danny Logan

Logan is on a trajectory to be the best to ever play the position. He’s won the Boiardi Award in three of his first four seasons. He’s become almost invisible on the field. Teams completely avoid him. Players, midfielders and attackmen alike, are scared to dodge on him.

His linemates — Max Krevsky and Chet Comizio — got way more action than him this year, despite playing less. They defended 4.7 and 5.5 shots per game, respectively, to Logan’s 3.7. This is partially due to players not being able to get shots off on Logan, and partially due to them avoiding him completely.

Philadelphia especially has consistently built its game plan around steering clear of Logan. The Waterdogs shot 0-for-12 on Logan (an average of two shots per game) and a combined 27-for-93 on New York’s other short sticks (15.5 per game) in their six meetings since 2023. The decision to dodge the other short stick is deliberate. Former Waterdogs head coach Andy Copelan often told his team in crunch-time huddles to “pick for [Michael Sowers] with whoever doesn’t have 91.”

The Waterdogs are the best team in the league at trapping players on the defensive end. They’ve taken 6.2 shots per game against offensive midfielders, faceoff specialists and attackmen, by far the most in the league. New York loves using offensive midfielders on their faceoff wings and is fine trusting them on defense. Philadelphia will take full advantage of this and keep these guys on defense so Logan can’t get on the field. In their two matchups this season, Reid Bowering and Jake Stevens defended the same number of shots as Logan.

If the Waterdogs keep the same game plan and take Logan out of the game, how can the Atlas counter? Would it be crazy to put Logan at close defense so he’s always on the field? Sowers has shot just 7-for-49 on unassisted shots against short sticks over the last three seasons, while Kieran McArdle has shot 6-for-40. If the Waterdogs want to avoid Logan, then the Atlas should consider making him unavoidable. Besides, Tyler Carpenter and Michael Grace coming out of the box together would be a lot of fun.

The Unbeatable Rookie: Dylan Hess

Like Logan, Hess is beginning to build a reputation for being avoided. The rookie out of Georgetown and Florida was nearly unbeatable one-on-one this regular season. Waterdogs opponents shot just 1-for-28 against him when unassisted. The only goal he allowed was a Hugh Kelleher jumper in the last quarter of the last game. This 3.6% shooting percentage against led all qualified players — long poles included.

New York’s midfield thrives on unassisted shots, averaging a league-high 19.5 per game. A high percentage of Kelleher’s (90.0%), Matt Traynor’s (67.3%) and Bryan Costabile’s (64.5%) shots were unassisted. Steven Brooks’ offense relies on these three party-starters to be able to get a bucket on their own in order to open up the field for the Connor Shellenberger–Xander Dickson and Jeff Teat–Reid Bowering two-man games. Hess shutting these options down would be huge for the Waterdogs defense.

His two linemates — Matt Whitcher and Christian Scarpello — round out maybe the most complete defensive midfield unit remaining. Whitcher and Scarpello anchored the Waterdogs’ defense en route to a PLL Championship in 2022.

The Swiss Army Knife: Brian Tevlin

While Hess and Logan are lockdown defenders, Tevlin is a Swiss Army knife. I don’t think one player has done more for one defense than Tevlin has done for the Redwoods in 2025. If this award were given to the most valuable SSDM, he’d be the runaway favorite.

After Chris Merle went down for the season in June with a torn ACL, there was a huge hole left in the Redwoods’ defensive midfield. California filled this loss with converted long pole BJ Farrare and rookie fourth-round pick Carter Rice. Both are capable players, but Tevlin needed to take a bigger role for the Woods’ defense to stay intact, and he did exactly that. He defended 69 shots in the regular season, second-most in the PLL and 20 more than any of his teammates.

And this wasn’t just against midfielders. Tevlin defended 27 shots against attackmen – second-most on California and more than starting close defensemen Chris Conlin, Cole Kastner and Arden Cohen. Despite this volume, he was still the team’s hardest player to score against, holding opponents to an impressive 17.4% shooting percentage against.

Tevlin led all SSDMs with 12 caused turnovers. This included one of the most memorable performances we’ve seen at his position against Boston in the Woods’ last and most important game of the season. He became the only short stick ever to record five caused turnovers in a game and helped his team clinch a playoff appearance. He’s caused 30 turnovers since being drafted in 2023 — 11 more than any other player at his position in that time frame.

Tevlin is one of the few defensive midfielders left in the league to consistently take wings on faceoffs. While most teams have moved to offensive midfielders in the 32-second shot clock era, the Woods still trust Tevlin. He picked up 22 ground balls off of faceoffs this season, leading all players at his position for the second straight year. And he helped turn those faceoff wins into successful offense, improving California’s 32-second efficiency from 17.6% in 2024 to 25.1% in ‘25. In addition to all of this, Tevlin has been huge on the Redwoods’ clear – ranking second in the league with 63.

Tevlin has been asked to defend every position on the field, be the No. 1 option on the clear and take every wing on faceoffs. He’s delivered on all of these tasks and then some.

The Human Clear: Ryan Terefenko

The only player Tevlin trails in clears is the fourth Hard Hat Award candidate, Terefenko, who may be the most athletic lacrosse player in the world. If the league tracked distance covered, Terefenko might be first by miles. Although he hasn’t been as much of a shutdown defender as the other three nominees, posting a 32.3% shooting percentage against, he’s contributed in transition much more than any player in the league. He recorded more than 70 clears for the fourth year in a row. No other defensive midfielder has ever had 70-plus clears in a season. His 290 clears since 2022 lead all other players by a landslide.

Fifth on this list is his linemate, Zach Geddes. If Terefenko is the Outlaws’ endurance runner, Geddes is their sprinter. He has legitimate sub-4.4 speed, and it shows when the Outlaws break out in transition. Eleven of Geddes’ 12 career goals have come within the first 10 seconds of the shot clock.

This pairing, along with Jake Piseno at LSM and goalie Logan McNaney dishing outlets, has helped the Outlaws score 2.1 goals per game in under 10 seconds — the most in the PLL. On the other side, California has given up the second-most goals in under 10 seconds at 1.4 per game.

We know that Geddes and Terefenko can be dangerous in transition, but can they defend?

The Outlaws’ defensive midfield has been below average in shooting percentage against this season. They’re lucky the Redwoods offense is very reliant on their top four guys, who will all be poled. If Terefenko can keep up his world-class contributions in between the lines, the Redwoods will have a tough time pulling off an upset.