Allison Akers

Including the Terrapin women’s lacrosse team, four of the top six programs in the country will today descend upon College Park with the  tournament title of the nation’s toughest conference on the line.

After the No. 3 Terps earned a share of the ACC regular season title with No. 1 North Carolina and No. 4 Virginia, this year’s tournament will play an important factor in determining the clear conference winner, as well as the top team in the country.

The tournament includes three rounds, with the top two teams receiving a bye. Since the Terps, Tar Heels and Cavaliers all finished with equal conference records and head-to-head records, the tiebreaker is goal differential in head-to-head matches.

The Terps (14-1, 4-1 ACC) had a plus-two goal differential, one fewer than North Carolina. Both the Terps and Tar Heels will get to watch as their fellow conference opponents fight for a second-round berth.

Despite winning a share of the conference title, Virginia received the No. 3 seed. They’ll play without the luxury of a first-round bye, making their road to the championship much more demanding. Today, the Cavaliers face Virginia Tech.

“We have to play three games in four days to win it and against some of the top teams in the country,” Virginia coach Julie Myers said. “It makes it difficult.”

The Terps will play the winner of that game tomorrow, while the Tar Heels will face the winner of No. 6 Duke and No. 16 Boston College. Boasting a high ranking all season, Duke is also among the favorites to win the title. But even the Eagles enter the tournament as a possible title-contending team, hoping to knock off some of the perennial contenders. Duke coach Kerstin Kimel said she already knows that.

“They’re a damn good team, and they should be ranked higher than that,” Kimel said. “But with everyone ranked so high, having the opportunity to play a high-level opponent helps our RPI.”

The format of the tournament makes it difficult for teams that play in the first round to win it all. Only once in the past four years has a team that played in the first round won the ACC championship — which means winning three games in four days.

“It’s a lot of running, it’s a big field, and there aren’t that many timeouts — it can create a big challenge for teams playing in the first round,”  Kimel said. “It’s important to be well prepared and find ways to keep your team as fresh as possible. Those are the biggest keys to advancing.”

But Terps’ coach Cathy Reese knows that even with the first-round bye, any shot at winning the championship can disappear with one slipup.

“Any game can go any way,” Reese said. “A lot of these games have been really close. It’s just such an intense tournament.”

Only one goal decided four of the 10 matchups between top-five seeds this season. But the tournament isn’t just for bragging rights, it’s an important tool for evaluating teams for the NCAA Tournament selection in about two weeks. Just by competing, each team’s RPI and strength of schedule will likely increase, helping their résumés.

Still, it feels better to win an outright title than to share it with two other teams.

“We go into the ACC Tournament knowing that one team will come out on top,” Reese said, “and there will be a clear winner.”

TERP NOTE: The Terps placed a league-best five players on the All-ACC women’s lacrosse team, which was announced yesterday. Attackers Karri Ellen Johnson and Sarah Mollison, midfielders Caitlyn McFadden and Katie Schwarzmann and defender Karissa Taylor were all named to the team.

ceckard@umdbk.com