The Denver Outlaws came into 2025 with a good amount of optimism. Brennan O’Neill had firmly established himself as one of the best players in the world—if not the best. Being able to build your franchise around one player doesn’t automatically equate to wins, but it definitely makes the job easier. Finishing the season with a 5–5 record, second overall in the West, and a close loss in the playoffs, Outlaws fans should have been excited for what was to come. Flash forward to the end of Week Two of the 2025 PLL season, and Denver Outlaws fans now seemingly have reason to be nervous with how the team has been performing.
The talk of the town has been the fact that the Denver Outlaws have four Tewaaraton winners on their roster. Jared Bernhardt, following his career at Maryland, had a brief stint in the NFL where he looked to earn a roster spot at wide receiver. Flash forward to just two weeks ago, and Bernhardt made the decision to come back to lacrosse and make his PLL debut. This is one of the most exciting moments in Premier Lacrosse League history, as it’s really the first time we’ve seen free-agent rumblings for a big-name player and speculation about where exactly he would sign. He made the decision to go with the Outlaws, which made sense for a number of reasons. Bernhardt won the 2021 Tewaaraton with 99 points, made up of 71 goals and 28 assists. Fellow Terrapin Logan Wisnauskas repeated the award the following year with an impressive 103 points, tallying 61 goals and 42 assists. Brennan O’Neill obviously had a monster 2023, putting up 55 goals and 42 assists for 97 points. Notre Dame’s Pat Kavanagh followed that up with an 80-point season in 2024 to win the award himself.
On paper, this lineup is absolutely terrifying solely due to the versatility each of these players brings to the table. To have four collegiate MVPs on your roster should be an instant recipe for success—especially considering three of them are proven professional players, with Bernhardt looking to make his case. The only issue is, this team offensively has absolutely no structure. The Outlaws lost their opening game against the California Redwoods 15–12. From one-point shots, the team shot 24%, with only 53% of their shots even hitting the cage. You can’t score goals if you’re not hitting the cage at a consistent rate. What also stood out was the fact that the Denver Outlaws only had 215 touches compared to the Redwoods’ 304. That might not seem like a big discrepancy, but it certainly tells a story. The Outlaws showed that they look to attack one-on-ones, and if they did not win them outright, instead of moving the ball forward, they would take a low-level shot with a 50% chance of hitting the cage. This is not a recipe for winning lacrosse—especially at the PLL level. Wisnauskas threw together an excellent night, though, with four points coming off three goals and one assist on 75% shooting. O’Neill, on the other hand, had a solid four-point performance, but only scoring two goals on 22% shooting will really hurt the team long term—especially considering he was second on the team in touches at 29. Kavanagh didn’t help much either, with two goals coming off seven shots for just 28%.
Week Two saw Bernhardt’s debut, which had many fans excited to tune in. However, the Outlaws still lost 12–9 against a solid Carolina defense. Despite playing against an elite unit, shooting 16% is blatantly unacceptable—especially considering the fact that the team had four more minutes of possession time than the Chaos. Pair this with the fact that they also won the faceoff battle at 58% and improved their touches per game to 271, only scoring nine goals on 16% shooting underlines the real issue with this team. Too many players have the green light to go, go, go—with no clear structure on what to do after. Looking at our four Tewaaraton winners and their numbers highlights this even more. O’Neill had a nice hat trick, but it came off 10 shots, totaling just 30% shooting. That was the best performance of the weekend, considering Kavanagh shot 1-for-7 at 14% and Wisnauskas had no points on just two shots. Bernhardt gets a pass, as it was his professional debut and he put up 0 points—but the fact that he took five shots in his debut also highlights that he probably had a little too much of a green light with a PLL stick in his hand for the first time.
Players should play with confidence—especially when you arguably have four of the best players in the world. However, the other side of the ball—the defense—also gets paid to play lacrosse. Banking solely on winning one-on-ones and settling for low-quality shots will never be a formula for success. You can have the most talented players in the world, but a lack of direction and too much wiggle room on what is acceptable and what isn’t makes it difficult to play as a team. At the end of the day, this is a team game, and a disconnected offense will never take down an organized defense. The offense certainly has time to figure itself out, but the issue is the PLL season is relatively short compared to most professional sports. Having two catastrophically bad losses to start the year definitely hurts morale and makes it difficult to claw your way into a playoff spot. Don’t get me wrong—the Outlaws’ offense isn’t solely to blame here, as the goalie situation also has to be addressed. McElroy can’t throw together a 42% game against the Redwoods followed by a 36% dud against the Chaos.
There is too much talent on this team to not be competing for a PLL championship. Like everything though, it comes from the top down and how the team is structured. They have way too much of a green light to settle for mediocre dodges and low-quality shots without any sort of consequence. We’ll see how the team looks to improve its numbers in the coming weeks, but the current sample size does not leave much hope for the Outlaws’ ability to consistently put the ball in the back of the net.
