2012 NCAA Lacrosse Open Thread

[IrishLax]

What's the score and time. At a wedding can't see anything

Loyola 7 ND 5...... 6 minutes left

 

[NDdomer2]

Well........ it's a ball game..........................

What if we hadn't shot like total crap today?

Lol feeling the end is near hope they keep it up.

 

[Downinthebend]

down by two with 47 seconds left. They did just enough to be in a bad situation.

 

[IrishLax]

Well that's a bummer. Over-achieved like crazy this year for a team that graduated 5 All-Americans and we return the entire team next year except Max Pfeifer and Kevin Randall.

But boy did we have our chances.... some good saves by the Loyola goalie but most ****-poor finishing by Notre Dame. Defense played more than well enough to win. Only 1 settled goal the entire second half for Loyola.

 

[Wolverine1997]

Nice season, ND.

Can't wait for next year when Michigan plays you.

 

[Downinthebend]

When was the last time a team lost one faceoff the whole game and lost?

 

[IrishLax]

Nice season, ND.

Can't wait for next year when Michigan plays you.

Hopefully that happens. Thanks for stopping by this season and talking some lacrosse.

Duke vs. Maryland is on at 5 PM and then the championship game will be at 2:30 on Monday. Hopefully we get Duke vs. Loyola.

 

[FDNYIrish1]

Congratulations on a great season Irish. Be proud of what you accomplished this year. Lax, you must be a proud alumni of the program, they just didnt play well enough to win today. Some inopportune turnovers and bad shooting doomed them today. Defense really locked down the second half.

On a completely positive note, the Notre Dame lacrosse program has placed itself among the elite programs year in and year out. They will most definitely be back and will win on Memorial day before long. It is an exciting time to be a fan of lacrosse. Congrats boys. Go Irish!!!

 

[IrishLax]

Maryland just spanked Duke like I never would've thought was possible. The Terps are on fire.... Monday could be exciting if they play fast and don't stall.

 

[Old Man Mike]

My best to our great Notre Dame lacrosse team and program. Makes me feel very proud to be an alum when we give it a Champion's Try in any of our sports. Waiting to see our guys give it he!l next year. Applause.

 

[Downinthebend]

My best to our great Notre Dame soccer team and program. Makes me feel very proud to be an alum when we give it a Champion's Try in any of our sports. Waiting to see our guys give it he!l next year. Applause.

?

 

[Old Man Mike]

Fixed it. When you're old and distracted [I was just watching a soccer match] typing becomes disastrously automatic. It IS weird though as I was also watching some of Maryland/Duke.

Always nice to count on the ever-present error-vultures though for correction of flaws --- great for the humility.

 

[IrishLax]

Well Loyola absolutely drubbed Maryland today 9-3.... completely shut out Maryland in the second half... a Maryland team that two days ago scored 16 goals against Duke.

So I feel better about our lack of offense all things considered. That big goalie for Loyola played really strong in cage and their individuals defenders did a completely fantastic job of playing athletic pressure defense.

Your next season top 6 will look something like Loyola, Notre Dame, Duke, Maryland, and UNC/Hopkins. And thus concludes this season of NCAA lacrosse.

 

[FDNYIrish1]

I was shocked at how smooth that Loyola keeper was today. He was all over everything they threw at him. Great performance. Haus from Maryland is going to have nightmares watching that film with some of the clean looks he had. He was winning those matchups from behind against Loyolas shorty, just couldn't finish. I am now impressed with the hounds. Glad to see another first timer win the title. Loyola has a great lacrosse tradition and this is well deserved. Look forward to contributing in the Lax thread next season. Thanks for letting me talk lax with you all.

 

[Downinthebend]

ND preseason #1?

 

[IrishLax]

ND preseason #1?

Maybe, although it'll likely be Maryland or Duke or even Loyola. ND should be top 4 which will be our highest preseason ranking ever. Here's the final poll from this year and all of the top 4 teams return a lot of their talent... while teams 5-7 all lose substantial talent.

1 Loyola University
2 University of Maryland
3 University of Notre Dame
4 Duke University
5 University of Virginia
6 University of Denver
7 Johns Hopkins University
8 Colgate University
9 Lehigh University
10 University of Massachusetts
11 University of North Carolina
12 Yale University
13 Princeton University
14 Syracuse University
15 Penn State University
16 Cornell University
17 Fairfield University
18 Ohio State University
19 Bryant University
20 Saint Johns University

This is the second time in the past three years that Notre Dame lacrosse has finished ranked in the top 3 nationally. Notre Dame started the year #9. Notre Dame has been ranked in the top 10 for 5 straight years now dating back to 2008.

 

[yankeeND]

How is ND recruiting in lacrosse? Seems like I've seen names pop up here and there but was before I started following the sport.

Great season ND! Hope for plenty more to come!

 

[IrishLax]

How is ND recruiting in lacrosse? Seems like I've seen names pop up here and there but was before I started following the sport.

Great season ND! Hope for plenty more to come!

We're alright. Our #1 business school + inroads to east coast Catholic high schools + consistent on the field success enables us to land some top talent. The interesting thing is that our coaches often don't pursue the typical Under Armour All-American types... instead, they look for guys who are a great fit for the program... both mentally and athletically.

Our staff rarely recruits someone who isn't a two sport athlete or all-around superior athlete. When they do, it's usually at attack and usually the guy is a special talent. If you look at our midfielders, there are a shocking number of guys who were all-state football players or basketball players or soccer players or hockey players. For instance, Steve Murphy was 1st team all-state as QB/WR... Sergio Perkovic from Brother Rice could be a D1 OLB... defensive captain Kevin Randall earned varsity letters in 4 different sports (football, basketball, soccer, lacrosse)... the list goes on and on.

So often we don't finish high in the recruiting rankings, but the players who come to Notre Dame are as athletic as anyone in the country and extremely mentally strong competitors. That's why we have "over performed" our pre-season ranking for 5 straight years. Teams like UNC do the exact opposite... sign the #1 class almost every year and then play with no discipline en route to a first round playoff exit.

 

[IrishLax]

Also of note, we have a guy coming in next year named Matt Kavanagh who could be the best attack player we've had since Ryan Hoff. He's only 5'8" but has absolutely incredible skills. Out of high school, he was a top 10 overall player in the previous class but opted for a PG year (similar to how hockey players go play juniors) before heading to ND. He's a member of the U-19 National Team and has been the best player on that team during the summer circuit... he's scored 5 points in each of their last two exhibition games against teams of mixed HS/college "all-stars." In his last game he apparently could've had 7+ goals but current ND RS freshman (and #1 goalie recruit in his year) Conor Kelly made some incredible saves on him in a game the Philly area all-stars eventually beat U-19 Team USA.

 

[yankeeND]

Thanks LAX! I really appreciate all the info you put on here! Like I've said earlier in this thread I am a newbie to the sport but watched every game I could this past season and really enjoyed it! I be learned a lot from your posts and feel almost ready to be able to explain it to other green horns. Thanks again brotha!

 

[IrishLax]

Incoming frosh Matt Kavanagh had something like 6 points in an 11-9 loss by Team USA to Team Canada at the U19 World Championships in Finland. First ever loss for the U19 Team USA in international play... although the elder men's team has a number of defeats to Canada on their record... so it's not that surprising. It should be noted that Kavanagh assisted on what would've been the game winnerain American rules a couple minutes into OT.... but in international lacrosse they do it like soccer and make you play out two short OT periods. Canada scored 3 goals in the second 4 minute OT period...

Kavanagh is, I think, the only player on the U19 team who didn't play in college last year... and has been the leading point producer in every single exhibition game and international contest for USA so far. He's going to be the best attack player Notre Dame has maybe ever had when he steps on campus in the fall... certainly not a sure thing he's as good as Yeatman/Hoff but he's been downright dominant in every setting this summer. Apparently he also had an insane diving one-handed goal diving from behind the cage in the first half that got waived off erroneously by the officials.

Hopefully someone puts up Youtube highlights at some point.

 

[yankeeND]

He sounds like he will be an exciting guy to watch. Hope he brings home a couple NC's for the Dome!

 

[NDinL.A.]

So my 2nd day in South Bend, I popped my ankle, meaning I haven't been able to run for the past 2 weeks. So I've been riding a bicycle for exercise, and rode over ND the other day. Lax, that lacrosse stadium is niiiiiiiiiiice! The wide gate was wide open, so I walked onto the field....such a sweet field. Is the ND lacrosse stadium one of the better ones in the country or is it middle-of-the-road in comparison? For those who have never seen it, I took a couple of pics from my phone:

Also, I've been reading in the local player that a kid by the name of Kavanagh who playing for the U19 USA team and killing it there; he'll be a freshman at ND this fall. Is he supposed to be a superstar for us, like a 5 star recruit (a Manti or a Floyd), or is he just a really good player?

 

[IrishLax]

Yeah, our facilities are the best in the country. It's not even close. I hear that when Hopkins finishes building theirs that they might be better. Owe it all to the very generous Arlotta family. John and Bobbie are some of the nicest people I've ever met and without them we would have none of this.

This is also why I repeatedly joke that something is really out of whack when our lacrosse team plays on a better surface than legendary Notre Dame football....

 

[IrishLax]

As for Matt Kavanagh..... total stud. No one knew he was going to be quite this good. He just got MVP of the U19 World Championships where he averaged ~5 points a game... no one else in the tournament even came close to averaging 4. Best player on Team USA and in the entire tournament according to basically everyone... and there was some serious talent there who, unlike Kavanagh, have also played a season or two in college.

Kavanagh was a consensus top 10 style player coming out of HS before he opted to PG... so not really the mega-recruit that a Te'o or Clausen would be... but damn good. The weirdest thing was that he was basically unheard of until his junior season... then went from middle tier D1... to highly regarded.... to really highly regarded.... to now after his PG year and the U19 championships being a "holy sh*t" type player. Inside Lacrosse just released rankings of all postgrad players coming into D1 and he was #1 and got a full two page article dedicated to his awesomeness. He'll play from Day 1 as either an offensive midfielder or attack (his natural position).

But the best part? His attitude. The reason why ND wins in lacrosse is because we get guys like Kavanagh who aren't just "hard workers" like everyone gives lip service to.... they are extremely team oriented guys singularly focused on nothing but winning and willing to do anything to get the W. Kavanagh has a Jordan-esque competitive streak by all accounts. Despite a diminutive 5'8" frame, he battles incredibly fiercely in all facets of the game... I imagine he gets some of that from his hockey background. Here are some quotes from the U19 championships:

Current Virginia standout Ryan Tucker:

If I was the coach at Notre Dame, I would put him on the field right away. That kid has everything you want in a player; an unbelievable heart. He will literally do anything for the team, and anything to win. I've never seen a player like that. He could have a broken arm and still play. He sells out for every ground ball. He will beat every defender in the country, in the world. The MVP honors for Matt Kavanagh are well-deserved and right on.

His Team USA coach:

He's a great, great player, maybe a greater person. Just an amazing talent and heart, and somebody who is fearless and plays the game the way it's supposed to be played.

So yeah... lots of reason to be excited.

 

[peoriairish]

The Fighting Irish ‏@FightingIrish
Cheers to @NDlacrosse for signing the No. 8 freshman class in the country! Fighting Irish Announce No. 8 Ranked Freshman Class - UND.COM - University of Notre Dame Official Athletic Site #GoIrish

Nice haul.

 

[IrishLax]

The Fighting Irish ‏@FightingIrish
Cheers to @NDlacrosse for signing the No. 8 freshman class in the country! Fighting Irish Announce No. 8 Ranked Freshman Class - UND.COM - University of Notre Dame Official Athletic Site #GoIrish

Nice haul.

If you think this year's class is good, you should see the '14 class. 8 kids ranked in the Top 40 overall players... which is just insane for any school, but especially for ND. We don't usually get the highly touted types save for two or three kids a year... usually we're taking hard working, athletic, high IQ guys who fit our systems. For reference the highest ranked frosh in this #8 class is ranked #49 and we only have 3 players in the Top 100. To be fair though, the only reason our class is #8 is because Matt Kavanagh (#1 PG recruit) is considered one of the top 3 or so overall players stepping on campus this fall.

The best thing about recruiting in lacrosse? You rarely, if ever, see decommits.

 

[peoriairish]

That's awesome to see. Good stuff.

 

[irishfanjho15]

If you think this year's class is good, you should see the '14 class. 8 kids ranked in the Top 40 overall players... which is just insane for any school, but especially for ND. We don't usually get the highly touted types save for two or three kids a year... usually we're taking hard working, athletic, high IQ guys who fit our systems. For reference the highest ranked frosh in this #8 class is ranked #49 and we only have 3 players in the Top 100. To be fair though, the only reason our class is #8 is because Matt Kavanagh (#1 PG recruit) is considered one of the top 3 or so overall players stepping on campus this fall.

The best thing about recruiting in lacrosse? You rarely, if ever, see decommits.

And that's good for your blood pressure grin:

 

[TheChosen1]

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