Opening Draw: The 2016 Colonial Athletic Association (CAA) schedule kicks off Saturday as No. 17/19 Towson welcomes long-time rival Delaware to Unitas Stadium. Saturday is the third and final doubleheader of the year with the Towson men's team. However, this time the ladies take the field first with opening draw set for 12 noon. Towson Sports Network's Ben Rosenbaum will have the call of the game starting at 11:45 a.m. Links to live stats and the video feed can be found on TowsonTigers.com. Fans can also follow the Tigers on Twitter (@Towson_WLAX) for updates.

Updating the Tigers: Towson will be looking to snap a two-game losing streak Saturday after a tough 7-4 loss to then No. 16 Penn last Saturday. Junior midfielder Samantha Brookhart led the team with a goal and an assist in that contest while freshman Angie Benson made a career-high nine saves. Sophomore midfielder Kaitlyn Montalbano leads the Tigers on the season with 24 points on 16 goals and eight assists. Freshman attacker Carly Tellekamp has contributed 14 goals and two assists for 16 points. Seven Tigers have scooped up 10 or more ground balls this season and that group is led by sophomore defender Tianna Wallpher, who has 16. Wallpher also leads the team with 14 caused turnovers. Senior midfielder Breanna Hamm, Brookhart and Montalbano have all pulled down a team-high 13 draw controls. Benson brings a 6.82 goals against average and a .429 save percentage into the weekend's action.

Scouting Delaware: Delaware had a six-game win streak snapped with an 8-7 loss at No. 11 Stony Brook last time out. Becky Goshler led the Blue Hens with two goals and four draw controls in that contest. Casey Lyons powers the Blue Hens' offense with 43 points on 20 goals and 23 assists. Jamie Schwartz has contributed a team-high 23 goals and five assists for 28 points. Erin Wein, the current CAA Defensive Player of the Week, does a little bit of everything for Delaware. Wein has three goals, seven assists, 16 ground balls, eight draw controls and a team-best 27 caused turnovers. Goshler has pulled down a team-high 26 draw controls to go with 13 goals and two assists. Taylor Carpentier carries a 7.31 goals against average and a .482 save percentage into the game.

Towson-Delaware Series History: Saturday's game will be the 50th all-time meeting between the Tigers and Blue Hens. Delaware leads the series, 31-18. The Blue Hens snapped an eight-game Tiger win streak with a 6-5 victory when the two squads met in Newark last season. Towson found itself down 3-0 in that game but rallied back and tied the game at 5-5 on an Emily Gillingham goal. However, Caitlin McCartney scored the game-winning goal with 16.7 seconds to play. Gillingham led the Tigers with a pair of goals in that contest.
 
Here We Go: Saturday's game signals the start of the the 2016 Colonial Athletic Association (CAA) schedule. It will be the Tigers' 15th CAA opener and Towson is 9-5 in the previous 14. The Tigers are 4-1 in CAA openers under Head Coach Sonia LaMonica after falling to Delaware last year. This will be the 12th time the Tigers face Delaware in their CAA opener. Towson is 8-3 when it plays the Blue Hens to open CAA play.

Looking Back at 2015: Towson made its eighth straight appearance in the CAA Tournament in 2015. However, for the first time since 2010 that the Tigers didn't at least share a piece of the CAA regular season title. Towson went 3-3 last year in CAA play. Hofstra was the number one seed after going 6-0 in CAA play, followed by James Madison and Delaware. Despite having the lowest seed, Towson showed it was ready to play in the tournament. Towson rallied while playing two-women down for a 7-3 overtime victory over Hofstra. That win moved Towson into it's fifth straight CAA Championship game. In the title game, James Madison earned a 15-9 win. That ended the Tigers' streak of CAA Championships at three straight.

In the Polls: Despite falling to two Top 20 teams last week the Tigers maintained their foothold in the national rankings released on Monday. Towson held its spot in the Intercollegiate Women's Lacrosse Coaches Association (IWLCA) poll, coming in at No. 17 for the second straight week. The Tigers slipped to No. 19 in both the ILWomen.com Media poll and the Nike/Lacrosse Magazine poll this week.

Just the Way We Drew It up: Senior midfielder Breanna Hamm pulled down two draw controls in last Saturday's contest against Penn. That raised her season total to 13 draw controls and her career total to 136 draw controls. Hamm currently sits fourth in career history at Towson for draw controls. She needs five more draw controls to move into a tie with Stephanie Howell (141, 2001-04) for third place on the career draw controls list at Towson.

What's Next? Towson is back in action on Saturday, April 1. The Tigers make the short trip up Charles Street to battle Johns Hopkins at 1 p.m.