2013 NCAA Lacrosse Open Thread

[IrishLax]

I just figured out the all access thing....bummer.
Gametracker isn't working again either.
Hopefully the blog will work.

Refresh gametracker... it's working now.

I paid up for the video feed. ND pouring on the offense in the opening frame.

Gave up a stupid transition goal (story of the year right now... don't know if it's new rules or what, but way more transitions goals than typical) and a bouncer early on off this "old school" astro turf. Since then, ND has 4 unanswered and 14 shots in the quarter. Two stupid penalties (think both were questionable calls) and Providence is man up to start the 3rd.

ND got the stop on Providence man-up but then blows the clear (the other story of the year... clearing game is terrible) and Providence gets back and scores.

Officiating is a ****ing joke. ND just got hit with an incredibly weak slash call. Third penalty of the half. None on Providence. I think ND has had the ball on offense for 3 minutes tops this quarter.

Just horrendous amounts of bullshit right now. ND gets a stop man-down but blows the clear (again) and Providence gets the ball back. They got a stall warning called on them (I think their 5th of the half) but the refs somehow let them get ~40 seconds of game time on their possession and it ends with an empty net goal as Kemp chased a ground ball behind the cage and Providence passed it up top to a player who shot on the empty net. ND had 4 minutes of possession tops in that 2nd quarter as Providence is playing stall ball AND the refs are bailing them out with bogus penalties. Absolutely must possess the ball better in the second half.

 

[IrishLax]

And second ****** bounce shot that goes in for Providence on this ridiculous "old school" turf. Kemp is visibly pissed off. You shouldn't be allowed to play on fields like this. Doyle immediately answers and ND leads 6-5.

ND has already missed two very easy doorstep chances but Providence gets flagged for the first time and we'll be man-up.

Providence's goalie makes another doorstep save (he's playing awesome) and then on D ND can't pick up a ground ball after a stall warning and the unsettled situation leads to a Providence goal. All tied up at 6.

 

[IrishLax]

Corrigan made a good play!

Rips a well placed shot on EMO. ND leads 8 to 6.

SICK shot by Sean Rogers makes it 9 to 6.

9-6 at end of the 3rd. Providence honestly playing some exciting pressure defense that, while leaving them very vulnerable at times, is also forcing a lot of turnovers. One Providence player had a nasty wrap check for a turnover on a ND clear at the end of the 3Q. Reminds me of how Duke tried to play us in the first game except that Providence's goalie has been more up to the task of stopping shots.

 

[IrishLax]

Awesome 3 minute possession by ND ends in a penalty by Providence and then Kavanagh scores on the EMO to make it 10-6 with 8:30 left.

Providence gets another crappy bouncer from about 15 yards out fading away from the goal. Just ridiculous. Makes it 10-7 ND with 5:30 left.

Goals by Rogers and Marlatt seal the deal. ND up 12 to 7 with 2:30 to play. Providence scores with 3 seconds left to give us the final margin of 13 to 8.

THE GOOD: Absolutely dominant at the faceoff X even without O'Connor. Won 20/24 faceoffs. All-around solid performance against a team that doesn't suck... but with a +16 possession edge via faceoffs you probably expect to win by a bit more. With that being said, 3/8 goals were bounce shots that took laughable bounces on the turf and one came with 3 seconds after Providence called a timeout with 10 seconds left to set up a play... while down by 6. So the defense played good... and there was the freak empty net goal. So not many goals where we legitimately got beat due to them making good plays a la Denver or St. John's. And we forced Providence into something like 10 stall warnings which is absurd. After the game got tied at 6-6... ND went on a 7-1 run over the final quarter and a half to ice it.

THE BAD: Turnovers, blown clears, and missed easy goals. Providence was successful in extending their defense and forcing turnovers pretty regularly as none of our players are really dominant ball handlers. When we did keep our composure we ran effective offense, but I count 13 individual turnovers and there are probably some more "team" turnovers not currently on the stat sheet. That's crazy bad. We went a pitiful 13/17 on clears and these blown clears lead directly to a number of Providence goals. This is similar to what screwed us against St. John's... when you get a stop after a long defensive possession, you have to clear the ball. This will absolutely come back to bite us against a better team like Villanova or Syracuse. And our shooting accuracy was far from perfect. We had a number of really good looks at the goal where we just simply missed or the goalie made a great save. Shooting 28% isn't terrible but when you consider how many bunnies we missed... probably should've gotten up to 16 or so goals today with our dominance on faceoffs.

 

[irishrb]

Thanks for the updates LAX. We did get Gametracker to come up.
Things that stuck out to me:
20/24 faceoffs-Are you kidding me? Is Nick the answer???
46 shots? Great aggressiveness or impatient offense?
4 or 5 failed clears....Have to clean that up...
I should have paid for the feed. I just figured by the time I put all my information in and got it to come up I would have missed a full quarter.
I think the rest of their games are on actual tv. I'm also thinking about going to the Big East Champioship game WHEN they get there.
GO IRISH!

 

[IrishLax]

Thanks for the updates LAX. We did get Gametracker to come up.
Things that stuck out to me:
20/24 faceoffs-Are you kidding me? Is Nick the answer???
46 shots? Great aggressiveness or impatient offense?
4 or 5 failed clears....Have to clean that up...
I should have paid for the feed. I just figured by the time I put all my information in and got it to come up I would have missed a full quarter.
I think the rest of their games are on actual tv. I'm also thinking about going to the Big East Champioship game WHEN they get there.
GO IRISH!

Nick Ossello won almost every single draw. It helped that Providence didn't have great wings to make plays to help our their draw man because he was getting beat like a rented drum. Trevor Brosco was also 3/3... so I'm leaning towards Providence just being really bad at faceoffs... but upon further review Providence is around middle of the pack at 48%. So maybe with O'Connor out Ossello has just been focusing more on faceoffs and has stepped up his game. He seems to have a limited repertoire of moves... but at the same time, maybe he wasn't changing it up because he was so darn effective.

The high shot total is mostly indicative of Providence's aggressive defense and our huge possession edge due to faceoffs. Only a handful of the shots we took would I consider impatient/bad. With some better luck or accuracy we might've broken the scoreboard... Kavanagh shot a pitiful 1/7 and had some really good looks.

The other interesting note should be that ND ran 3 midfield lines today. The third line is Tyler Brenneman, Connor McCollough, and Westy Hopkins. They were pretty effective... I like them getting Westy Hopkins on the field that way (he had 1G, 1A). John Scioscia had 1G on 1 shot but he sat for a large portion of the game for Conor Doyle (3G, 1A) probably because Doyle is more a dodging threat/ball handler and they were really extending their defense.

Will Corrigan also had 3 points (1G, 2A) on perfect shooting and didn't turn the ball over either... that was nice to see.

 

[IrishLax]

Bellarmine all tied up with Denver with 2 remaining in the 4Q. Would be a big upset, but Denver has looked quite vulnerable recently. Needed OT to get by Air Force.

EDIT: headed into 2nd OT period. Dillon Ward has a ridiculous 20 saves on 30 SOG for Bellarmine. And Denver wins it 11-10 in 2OT. Big scare for the Pioneers.

 

[FDNYIrish1]

Lax I didn't get to see the game but what was the poor clearing due to? Pressure a la Bucknell with the 10 man or just sloppy turnovers? Reading your synopsis you can't help but be happy with face off results. Sometimes that just comes down to styles it seems.

Kind of surprised Providence was able to press out with success, but also sounds like they had great looks. Wins a win, but you want to start cleaning things up this time of year.

 

[IrishSpartan]

And there were many that didnt agree with my statement about Albany

 

[IrishLax]

Lax I didn't get to see the game but what was the poor clearing due to? Pressure a la Bucknell with the 10 man or just sloppy turnovers? Reading your synopsis you can't help but be happy with face off results. Sometimes that just comes down to styles it seems.

Kind of surprised Providence was able to press out with success, but also sounds like they had great looks. Wins a win, but you want to start cleaning things up this time of year.

It's really miffing to me. This is three straight games now where we've had pretty big issues with it (against Marquette wasn't horrible, but against St. John's was really bad).

Watching St. John's and Providence, what stuck out to me is that when we don't clear with urgency is when we have the issues. Both teams basically employed an off ride with their attackmen after some initial pressure. They seem to lock off the midfielders and then back up their attackmen to midfield where they apply minimal pressure to the ball... but we take such a large amount of time then looking for the open man that we risk a failure to advance violation and sometimes we just make bad/stupid passes. Other times it's a good check that dislodges the ball from a midfielder. So it's a myriad of things... but what it boils down to is that ND tries to substitute on the fly while clearing to get some offensive midfielders on the field, and during this substitution time is when we often run into problems. The LSM seems to head immediately for the box when the clear starts.

If I'm Notre Dame, I'm trying to break out faster with my d-middies and LSM. I'm trying to push the ball immediately into the offensive zone and then starting my substitution. It makes sense on the breakout to have the LSM head towards the box and get off the field if he can, but a lot of times he's the open man as the opponent subs and if you get him the ball he can clear it relatively unopposed.

 

[IrishLax]

'Cuse vs. Cornell coming up at 6on ESPNU. Should be a great game.

 

[IrishSpartan]

Just got news our game against Davenport will be televised!

 

[irishrb]

Cornell/Syracuse...Great game. That should help Notre Dame...with the ranking and eventually RPI...when they beat the Cuse!!

 

[IrishLax]

Duke beats Virginia 19-16. Stick a fork in the Wahoos... I doubt winning the ACC tournament will even get them in.

 

[irishrb]

We just finished watching that game. I was hoping to see Virginia knock Duke off but I guess that helps ND's RPI? Both defenses in that game just looked a step slow to me.

 

[irishrb]

My boys have gotten their friends addicted to lacrosse so I'll be heading over with a car full to see PSU take on Towson. Hopefully it's a little closer game than last week.

 

[IrishLax]

We just finished watching that game. I was hoping to see Virginia knock Duke off but I guess that helps ND's RPI? Both defenses in that game just looked a step slow to me.

They were horrendous. This is why Duke gets blown out by teams like Maryland and ND... aggresive/porous defense where if they aren't getting turnovers or controlling faceoffs they give up too many goals and can't get to 15+ against a good D. Their team revolves around the ability to go on big goal scoring runs.

 

[FDNYIrish1]

That pole the Dookies have on face offs was laying some lumber out there last night. I was shocked he wasnt called for slashing on numerous occasions. UVA has so much talent, it's strange to see them struggle so badly. Losing LaPierre must have hurt more than I thought.
Duke is a notoriously slow starting team, I wonder how much of that is attributable to the fact they don't do a regular fall ball where they compete with other teams.
Gtown on Sunday, what are your thoughts? I know very little about them except they seem to have caught the Johnnies sleeping last week after beating the Irish.

 

[irishrb]

I don't know much about Georgetown. I checked out their website and they are 5-6. It also looks like they turn the ball over quite a bit. I expect a good home showing from the Irish and a solid 4 goal win.

 

[IrishLax]

Good preview of the games this week (obviously 2 of the games are already in the books): Quint: Judgment Week in Lacrosse | InsideLacrosse.com

Don't sleep on Georgetown... they were horrible to start the year with their new coach but have really started playing well the last 3 weeks. They play quite good defense but their offense can be anemic at times (however, they dropped 17 on Marquette and 14 on St. John's recently). The key to beating Georgetown is possessing the ball so that their offense plays rushed and turns the ball over. They are the kind of team where if you get a big lead early they're not coming back.

They're 53rd out of 63 teams in adjusted offensive efficiency and 43rd in adjusted defensive efficiency... but have been playing much better than that recently. They're squarely in the top 20 in both faceoffs and ball possession so really this game will come down to Nick Ossello winning his fair share of draws and us not turning the ball over... if that happens expect something like a 9-6 to 10-5 game in favor of ND.

 

[IrishLax]

At the Hopkins vs Maryland game today... game is ridiculously hype. Fireworks, jumbotrons, mascot, smoke machines, and remixed "black and yellow" to "fear the turtle."

Turn on ESPN if you want to catch it.

 

[irishrb]

Went to the PSU/Towson game. PSU is really on a roll. They were smothering Towson and they just couldn't get much going. It seemed like every time Towson got the ball, PSU knocked it loose. They also mixed up their D pretty well to keep Towson off balance. I was actually surprised they only won by 2.
Hopkins/Maryland...we just watched that game. The crowd looked ridiculous compared to the PSU game. That was a good game. Both teams seemed pretty fluid to me and both goalies looked great. I was kind of rooting for Maryland just to see Hopkins not make the tourney. I guess that helps ND though...as long as they win tomorrow!

 

[irishrb]

TERRIBLE start for the Irish. They just don't look good right now. Hopefully they can get their heads into this game.

 

[IrishLax]

TERRIBLE start for the Irish. They just don't look good right now. Hopefully they can get their heads into this game.

Freaking horrendous. Don't know how Doyle didn't score that 1-on-none... and then give up a bounce pass for a goal? Kemp can't save a beach ball right now.

 

[IrishLax]

Well after that abysmal 1Q we played marginally better in the second 5-4 at half... last year we rallied from being down 5-1 at half, so no need to panic. Shooting accuracy still leaves a lot to be desired.

 

[irishrb]

That is EXACTLY what I just told my boys. Last year they left them for dead and went out and I had to bring them back in to tell them they won. I still don't have a very good feeling about this game now. Hopefully I am wrong. For my boys' sakes I am trying to remain optimistic.

 

[IrishLax]

Trevor Brosco playing HUGE at the faceoff X right now!

 

[irishrb]

Feelings are getting better now. Faceoffs HUGE!

 

[yankeeND]

Starting the second half off right!

 

[IrishLax]

Kemp is playing soooooo bad... has let in 3 goals now from 15 yards plus