The senior midfielder is one of three First Team All-Big East honorees from Marquette in the women’s lacrosse postseason awards.
The 2024 season may not have ended with a postseason trip for Marquette women’s lacrosse, but that doesn’t mean there’s not good news for the Golden Eagles. On Wednesday, the Big East announced the postseason awards for the league, and the top line item for Marquette is that senior midfielder Leigh Steiner was named Midfielder of the Year!
Steiner is the third Marquette player to earn Midfielder of the Year and the second straight to do so after Lydia Foust took home the trophy a year ago. Grace Gabriel was responsible for MU having the MOTY in both 2018 and 2019, making this the fourth time that a Marquette player has won the award.
Here’s what the Big East wrote about Steiner in their press release:
Steiner is the second consecutive and third ever Marquette player to earn the BIG EAST Midfielder of the Year award. Lydia Foust earned the honor last season, while Grace Gabriel shared the honors in both the 2019 and 2018 season. The senior finished top five in the conference in goals (45, fourth) and total points (61, t-third), while averaging the second-most shots per game with 7.12 per contest. The three-time BIG EAST Midfielder of the Week also tallied the highest single-game goal total in BIG EAST play with eight scores on April 3 against Butler.
And here’s what Marquette added about her in their release:
Steiner, who was named BIG EAST Midfielder of the Week three times this season, started in all 17 games and totalled 45 goals and 16 assists.
The Eden Prairie, Minnesota native finished the season with the sixth-most goals (45) and fourth-most shots (121) in a season in program history.
Steiner was not the only Golden Eagle to be recognized by the league and the voting of the coaches for their play this season. Attacker Meg Bireley was a unanimous choice to the 20 woman All-Big East First Team, just like Steiner, while Josie Kropp joined them there as a draw specialist. Here’s what the MU press release wrote up about both of them:
Meg Bireley earned unanimous All-BIG EAST First Team honors after leading the league with 69 goals, top five in the NCAA and the most in a single season in program history. Bireley led the BIG EAST in goals per game (4.06), points per game (4.47), and shots per game (8.94).
The junior from Glenville, Illinois was tabbed BIG EAST Attacker of the Week three times and ended the season with 76 points, the third-most in a single season in program history.
Josie Kropp was named to the All-BIG EAST First Team after leading the conference with 136 draw controls that ranked top 10 in the nation.
Kropp broke the single season record for draw controls in 15 games and had a program single game record tying 17 draw controls at Detroit Mercy in February. The Prior Lake, Minnesota native had 5-or-more draw controls in 13-of-17 games.
Even with 20 women honored on the First Team, the league still found a way to put together a 16 woman Second Team. Again: With the exception of honoring a draw specialist, can we figure out a way to get these things down to the number of people who are actually on the field at one time, which is 12 for women’s lacrosse?
ANYWAY
The Big East did honor both Kaitlyn Huber and Tess Osburn on the Second Team, so here’s their writeups from the MU press release.
Tess Osburn earned All-BIG EAST Second Team honors after a 39-point season with 32 goals and seven assists. The sophomore attacker had double-digit scoring performances in 11-of-17 games this season, including four goals in the season-opening win over Cincinnati.
Kaitlyn Huber was named to the All-BIG EAST Second Team after leading the team in caused turnovers with 20. The senior defender collected two weekly honors during the season and was named BIG EAST Defender of the Week on April 22 after MU led up just four goals on the road at Xavier.
You can read the entire Big East release with all of the individual awards and the full all-conference teams right here.