2013 NCAA Lacrosse Open Thread

[IrishLax]

Ohio State and Denver tied up in the third quarter. If Ohio State wins this game, ND is likely locked in to a top 2 seed. A win by Denver could have us as low as a 5 seed.

 

[IrishLax]

Ohio State wins 11-10. Unless the committee screws us we should be locked into #2 seed and play either Bryant or Detroit (if Detroit wins) in first round. At absolute worst, we should be #3 seed and get.... Towson? Still Bryant/Detroit?

 

[NDinL.A.]

Ohio State wins 11-10. Unless the committee screws us we should be locked into #2 seed and play either Bryant or Detroit (if Detroit wins) in first round. At absolute worst, we should be #3 seed and get.... Towson? Still Bryant/Detroit?

Home game? Would you know the probably date and time?

 

[IrishLax]

Home game? Would you know the probably date and time?

Will know on Sunday. It will be next weekend... would be soooooooo awesome to get Detroit. Please let the Titans beat the Siena Saints tomorrow afternoon.

 

[irishrb]

Sounds great. The way they ended the season a 2 seed would be awesome. I guess I'll be checking in on the score of the Detroit game tomorrow rooting pretty hard for them....even though I know absolutely nothing about them. Either way, GO IRISH! I really would love to see them make a serious run in this thing again!

 

[IrishLax]

Sounds great. The way they ended the season a 2 seed would be awesome. I guess I'll be checking in on the score of the Detroit game tomorrow rooting pretty hard for them....even though I know absolutely nothing about them. Either way, GO IRISH! I really would love to see them make a serious run in this thing again!

We might actually back in to a #1 seed. At worst, there's no objective way we should be below a #3 seed. Ohio State leapfrogged all the way up from #12 to #3 with their ECAC tournament run. So now we have wins over #3, #4 (UNC), and #5 (Denver) with two losses to #2 Syracuse.

If you replace our name with 'Maryland' or 'Hopkins' and you have that kind of resume (five games against RPI top 5... 3-2 record... and #1 overall RPI) you're a stone cold lock for the #1 seed. But our blowouts to Syracuse will hurt us on the subjective 'eye test' relative to UNC and Syracuse and we could drop as low as #3. To be fair, Syracuse and UNC are both playing MUCH better lacrosse right now than ND.

Either way, hard to see us getting anyone but Detroit (if they win) or Bryant in the first round because Towson likely gets sent to UNC for proximity reasons (326 miles) and Ohio State seems like a lock to host a game now and be seeded.... therefor, no one is close enough to be sent to ND (except maybe Penn State?). So if Detroit wins, we get them and Syracuse gets Bryant. If Siena wins, Syracuse gets them probably and we get Bryant. And no matter what, Towson gets sent to North Carolina.

Everyone else? Chaos. There is a legitimate chance that Duke gets left out of the tournament if Princeton wins tomorrow... or even if Yale wins, there is an outside chance. Same thing for Loyola who seemed like a stone cold lock with the #6 RPI heading into the weekend... then Ohio State happened.

 

[irishrb]

There should be no fair....Give them the one seed!

I love the analysis and predictions LAX. I guess I never realized how much travel reasons played a part in the first round opponents. I don't care how ND ended the season. They deserve a high seed and an easier first round match.
You've helped get me back in my positive mood right now. IF they get a Detroit or Byrant, that should give them a W, which will give them another week to get their Mo back. They have proven they can beat anyone, other than Syracuse, so why not start kicking it in high gear again.
Hopefully Coach Corrigan figures some things out on offense!
I also want to see Kemp play like the All American that he can be!

 

[IrishLax]

Detroit with a 5 goal rally and we're all tied up at 10 with 30 seconds to play. Let's go Titans!

EDIT: and Detroit wins 11-10 in OT! Almost surely will play ND in first round. Awesome.

 

[IrishLax]

Ohio State surges all the way up to #2 in final RPI. Seeding will be verrrrrrrrry interesting. I thought we might get #2 seed with Ohio State as our matching #7 but now it's looking like the Buckeyes might grab as high as a #4 seed. Hard to see them jumping UNC or Syracuse in any scenario.

Notre Dame, Ohio State, and Denver look like they're destined for Indianapolis quarterfinal bracket. The question is what other seeded team gets put with ND? Penn State? Maryland? Cornell?

 

[irishrb]

Ohio State surges all the way up to #2 in final RPI. Seeding will be verrrrrrrrry interesting. I thought we might get #2 seed with Ohio State as our matching #7 but now it's looking like the Buckeyes might grab as high as a #4 seed. Hard to see them jumping UNC or Syracuse in any scenario.

Notre Dame, Ohio State, and Denver look like they're destined for Indianapolis quarterfinal bracket. The question is what other seeded team gets put with ND? Penn State? Maryland? Cornell?

Very interesting indeed. I know my boys and I were excited to see Detroit win. I looked up their schedule and will be disappointed if ND doesn't get them and hammer them! We are totally pumped for the selection tonight. Who are you hoping their second round game is against?

 

[IrishLax]

Very interesting indeed. I know my boys and I were excited to see Detroit win. I looked up their schedule and will be disappointed if ND doesn't get them and hammer them! We are totally pumped for the selection tonight. Who are you hoping their second round game is against?

Best case scenario would be a team like Yale or Albany in an upset. Of likely seeded teams... would love to get Ohio State or Denver. Maryland/Duke would be really bad matchups on some levels.

 

[NDinL.A.]

Nice call LAX.

Detroit at ND at 5 on Saturday. Unless something in our schedule changes, I'm there.

 

[irishrb]

Best case scenario would be a team like Yale or Albany in an upset. Of likely seeded teams... would love to get Ohio State or Denver. Maryland/Duke would be really bad matchups on some levels.

Second round mathchup of Duke OR Loyola....YUCK! That totally sucks. Like I said to my boys though, it's the elite 8 so if you want to move on you have to beat some good teams. But YUCK!

 

[IrishLax]

Interesting draw. The first round bye sure is nice. And we avoid Cornell/Maryland which is a plus because Cornell oozes potential and Maryland plays a Syracuse-esque brand of D that could've doomed us. Loyola is an interesting team because their midfield D can be lights out at times... but honestly, they should get waxed by Duke. Duke is playing excellent O right now but porous D... but that all is irrelevant if Fowler dominates faceoffs. Duke makes the final 4 seemingly every single year since the whole scandal and should probably favored over us in round 2... with that being said, if we can win faceoffs and exploit their aggressive D we've got a good chance. There are absolutely no 'easy' teams after round 1 and every game can be considered a coin flip.

Most interesting seeding? Ohio State surging into the #3 spot. This sets up a collision course between UNC/Syracuse in the semis and gives the Buckeyes a MUCH easier first round game than UNC.

Easiest road? Definitely Syracuse. Penn State and Yale are both pretty ordinary teams that should get stomped by 'Cuse if they're "on". So go ahead and pencil them in right now and barring an implosion expect the Orange in Philly.

Weakest pod? Without a doubt North Carolina. Denver is outrageously overrated and Albany is just a worse version of UNC. If they get past Lehigh they should grab a spot... and a UNC/Syracuse semifinal would be a ridiculous game.

Most interesting pod? Cornell/Maryland/Ohio State/Towson. It wouldn't surprise me to see Ohio State go down in the first round... the two best teams are playing in the other game and both will be VERY hungry. Whether Maryland's offense is clicking will determine if they're a contender or a first round loser.

All things considered... if we had somehow lucked into Penn State/Yale as our second round game I'd LOVE our draw... but as is, I'll take the effective first round bye (Detroit! Woo!), regional in Indianapolis at Lucas Oil Stadium, and a difficult second round opponent. And long term, there is no doubt that it's better to be on the side of the bracket with Ohio State than the one with Syracuse/UNC. It's really weird that the Denver/UNC pod is slated for Indianapolis with Ohio State being slated for an effective away game against Maryland on Maryland's campus. I have no idea how that happens.

 

[FDNYIrish1]

Is UNC really a 5 seed? Arguably the hottest team in the country right now. Crazy year, I just hate the fact that so many important games are played so early in February. This is a spring sport, wish they could alter the schedules a bit to Play more in the warmer weather.

Irish get a favorable first round no doubt. Duke plays no defense whatsoever. Seems like first to 15 wins with them. Here's where you hope all those close games against a brutal schedule pay dividends for ND. Sorry to be captain obvious, but I hope they can get hot here. The way they limped through the end of the season does not instill a ton of confidence. How about a tournament pick pool guys? I'll be back later with predictions (I'm always wrong)!

 

[IrishLax]

Is UNC really a 5 seed? Arguably the hottest team in the country right now. Crazy year, I just hate the fact that so many important games are played so early in February. This is a spring sport, wish they could alter the schedules a bit to Play more in the warmer weather.

Irish get a favorable first round no doubt. Duke plays no defense whatsoever. Seems like first to 15 wins with them. Here's where you hope all those close games against a brutal schedule pay dividends for ND. Sorry to be captain obvious, but I hope they can get hot here. The way they limped through the end of the season does not instill a ton of confidence. How about a tournament pick pool guys? I'll be back later with predictions (I'm always wrong)!

Tournament pick 'em pool would be fun. We should definitely try to set that up.

No doubt UNC is playing MUCH better than a 5 seed. UNC and Syracuse are the two best teams in the country right now. If they get past Lehigh... who plays some really solid D... they should curb stomp either Denver or Albany.

 

[IrishLax]

Is it me or was ND just too timid on O both games against Syracuse? There were times where I thought their offense shot too quickly and too far out this year but at least they were being aggressive with taking shots. I still just didn't sense that urgency from them. It was like they just wanted to hold on to the ball a little longer to give their D a break...I don't know. I know I am frustrated and it's going to take me the full 9-10 days to get the positive vibes going for them again. What peaves me off the most is we were going to go to Philly on Saturday to watch them win the BE championship. Now they just totally ruined our plans.

Long winded response incoming...

This is the million dollar question for Notre Dame this year. First and foremost, we tried to "run" at times and it just failed. David Miller had one of the most stone cold easy 4 on 3 fastbreaks I've ever seen and it ended in a turnover. How does that happen? At the same time, when we played deliberate there were zero openings to attack.

The problem with the offense right now is a lack of initiators/ball handlers. Kavanagh is not a dodge first guy, but he's the best creator on the team right now... and that's sad. Typically, it's been the opposite problem for ND throughout the years... great dodgers/creators but no finishers. Let's take a quick look at the midfield for this year:

Marlatt - Big outside shot, not really a dodging threat. Mostly one-handed player. After teams started playing him tight he hasn't been a productive offensive player.
Foley - Best dodger we have, but has shot poorly all year. Typically draws the pole and isn't good enough to beat a good LSM consistently.
Corrigan - Good passer, lacks athleticism. Is not a dodging threat and therefor teams tend to have a blanket rule of not sliding to him.
Kimball - Hardest player to defend on our midfield right now. Athletic enough to dodge with authority and his shooting has been improving.
Murphy - One handed player that is athletic but lacks really high end stick skills... when he can out athlete his defender he is effective, when he can't he isn't a threat in really any facet.
Ossello - After taking over faceoff duties for injured O'Connor he gets very few reps... when he plays, he ha a solid all-around game and a powerful shot when he can step into it.
Hopkins - Really good dodger and inside finisher... lacks superior passing ability or an outside shot.

So basically all of our midfielders are 'flawed' players and teams now have solid scouting reports on how to defend them. This isn't a huge issue as long as our attack can do the heavy lifting... but when you have a loaded close D like Syracuse (or Maryland) then we're kinda effed.

How scary is this? Simply put, there are only a handful of teams with true shut down defenders and play the style of D that Syracuse employed. This is all a huge issue if and only if the other team has great 1v1 defenders and plays a 'no slide' or 'late slide' defense. Why did we lite up Denver for 13 goals? Because they played a zone where we could use passing/outside shooting as our primary method of attack. We do great against teams that we can out-athlete (e.g. Marquette) OR play a passive D (e.g. Denver) OR play an aggressive D with early slides/doubles (e.g. Duke).

What is the solution? Well, there isn't one that doesn't involve changing our offense. But really... we should be prepared to change our offense. It's actually quite easy to beat a 'no slide' team even without dodgers who can beat their man which is why most teams don't play that style of defense. First things first, we can't have people just standing around off ball. They need to be cutting in and out... rotating... picking for each other... otherwise creating chaos such that dodging lanes open up AND when a guy does get beat the help is going to be VERY late or non-existent.

Second, when you work in off-ball movement you can really complicate things by setting picks both on or off ball. When you set a pick, the defender must either fight through the pick or switch... the switching can cause miscommunication and if they try to fight through the pick that can give you the step of separation you need to draw a slide or get a shot off. Even if they defend picks well you can use them to create matchup issues and get your couple good dodgers on players they can beat.

So hopefully this week and next week our staff is working in wrinkles that will help us if we run into a team that plays a tough brand of D. But Corrigian & Co. really believe in having an identity and executing well without 'junk' offenses and defenses... so I'm skeptical we will really change very much at all.

 

[irishrb]

Long winded response incoming...

This is the million dollar question for Notre Dame this year. First and foremost, we tried to "run" at times and it just failed. David Miller had one of the most stone cold easy 4 on 3 fastbreaks I've ever seen and it ended in a turnover. How does that happen? At the same time, when we played deliberate there were zero openings to attack.

The problem with the offense right now is a lack of initiators/ball handlers. Kavanagh is not a dodge first guy, but he's the best creator on the team right now... and that's sad. Typically, it's been the opposite problem for ND throughout the years... great dodgers/creators but no finishers. Let's take a quick look at the midfield for this year:

Marlatt - Big outside shot, not really a dodging threat. Mostly one-handed player. After teams started playing him tight he hasn't been a productive offensive player.
Foley - Best dodger we have, but has shot poorly all year. Typically draws the pole and isn't good enough to beat a good LSM consistently.
Corrigan - Good passer, lacks athleticism. Is not a dodging threat and therefor teams tend to have a blanket rule of not sliding to him.
Kimball - Hardest player to defend on our midfield right now. Athletic enough to dodge with authority and his shooting has been improving.
Murphy - One handed player that is athletic but lacks really high end stick skills... when he can out athlete his defender he is effective, when he can't he isn't a threat in really any facet.
Ossello - After taking over faceoff duties for injured O'Connor he gets very few reps... when he plays, he ha a solid all-around game and a powerful shot when he can step into it.
Hopkins - Really good dodger and inside finisher... lacks superior passing ability or an outside shot.

So basically all of our midfielders are 'flawed' players and teams now have solid scouting reports on how to defend them. This isn't a huge issue as long as our attack can do the heavy lifting... but when you have a loaded close D like Syracuse (or Maryland) then we're kinda effed.

How scary is this? Simply put, there are only a handful of teams with true shut down defenders and play the style of D that Syracuse employed. This is all a huge issue if and only if the other team has great 1v1 defenders and plays a 'no slide' or 'late slide' defense. Why did we lite up Denver for 13 goals? Because they played a zone where we could use passing/outside shooting as our primary method of attack. We do great against teams that we can out-athlete (e.g. Marquette) OR play a passive D (e.g. Denver) OR play an aggressive D with early slides/doubles (e.g. Duke).

What is the solution? Well, there isn't one that doesn't involve changing our offense. But really... we should be prepared to change our offense. It's actually quite easy to beat a 'no slide' team even without dodgers who can beat their man which is why most teams don't play that style of defense. First things first, we can't have people just standing around off ball. They need to be cutting in and out... rotating... picking for each other... otherwise creating chaos such that dodging lanes open up AND when a guy does get beat the help is going to be VERY late or non-existent.

Second, when you work in off-ball movement you can really complicate things by setting picks both on or off ball. When you set a pick, the defender must either fight through the pick or switch... the switching can cause miscommunication and if they try to fight through the pick that can give you the step of separation you need to draw a slide or get a shot off. Even if they defend picks well you can use them to create matchup issues and get your couple good dodgers on players they can beat.

So hopefully this week and next week our staff is working in wrinkles that will help us if we run into a team that plays a tough brand of D. But Corrigian & Co. really believe in having an identity and executing well without 'junk' offenses and defenses... so I'm skeptical we will really change very much at all.

Thanks LAX......very insightful. I have a few LAX players on my team that also played basketball for me so I've been relating some off ball and on ball screens with them...sounds similar to what you're talking about.
I really hope we see some better movement in the tourney to make this O more productive! I guess we'll see.

 

[IrishLax]

Thanks LAX......very insightful. I have a few LAX players on my team that also played basketball for me so I've been relating some off ball and on ball screens with them...sounds similar to what you're talking about.
I really hope we see some better movement in the tourney to make this O more productive! I guess we'll see.

Basketball and lacrosse offensive/defensive theory are incredibly similar. There are tons upon tons of principles that transfer between the sports... everything from the inside/out game, dodging = attacking the basket off the dribble, zone = zone, slide package = help defense, funneling to the weak hand, etc. etc. etc. You're incredibly smart to put things in terms they will understand as the concepts on their most fundamental level are the exact same.

 

[irishrb]

Ya, I wouldn't give myself too much credit as it was an easy connection. It did work though as I could see the light come on for some of the children and the off ball movement was a little better. Bottom line is we're having fun.

A couple of other comments:

A pick it contest would be cool but I don't know if LAX has been wrong with a prediction that I have read so we might as well skip that and crown him champion.

Is anyone else annoyed that there are 4 games on Mother's Day? Odds are the only game I'll be around to see is Cuse...Blah. I guess I'll be taping the games and watching them on Monday and Tuesday evening.

 

[IrishLax]

Your Saturday viewing guide and first round preview...

12:00 - (5) UNC vs. Lehigh - ESPN2
An extremely intriguing matchup as it is a stark contrast of styles and these are two of the hotter teams in the NCAA right now. First things first, with the exception of Cornell, Lehigh is without a doubt the hardest draw possible for a UNC team that has been curb stomping the opposition as of late. To be fair... Lehigh is not an elite team... but many pundits rank them solidly in the top 10 (or even top 5) because... you know... polls are subjective. The issue with Lehigh is that they are laughably inconsistent on both sides of the ball. Sometimes their D is dialed in and suffocating with great goalie play... other times it gives up 15 goals to Air Force. Sometimes their O is dropping 12 goals on Penn State... other times it's scoring 4 a piece against Penn and UMASS in losses. So why are they a bad matchup for UNC? Because if they're able to possess the ball they're extremely tough and disciplined and won't let you go on large multi-goal runs like 'soft' ACC teams do. What happens if Lehigh jumps out to an early lead and wins faceoffs? Almost similar to the Kansas State vs. Oregon BCS game matchup and we all saw how eventually offensive prowess beats grit/determination. The difference is that in lacrosse you don't have to hand the ball to the other team after you score... still, I think UNC getting 'snubbed' a bit plays with some fire and beats Lehigh. Maybe quite handily. But the Mountain Hawks do have a chance at the upset.

2:30 - (8) Penn State vs. Yale - ESPNU
Experts love Yale. And I understand why when you look at what great team lacrosse they've played recently. And PSU hasn't been overly impressive lately. This game is a total coin flip, because the wildcard for Yale is their decided possession edge. PSU is the kind of team that is very dissimilar from an Albany or Denver in that they need to have the ball for sustained periods of time to run effective offense. When clicking, PSU is MUCH better than Yale. But I don't know if they'll be able to get clicking. I'll still take PSU to win a tight one because they're at home and have the nation's best goalie.

5:00 - (2) Notre Dame vs. Detroit - ESPNU
With all due respect to Detroit, they're literally the worst team we've played this year. Literally. You can make a stretch of a case to say Marquette is worse by advanced stats... but Detroit is flat out a couple tiers below every other team we played in our gauntlet of a season. Detroit's only chance is that ND's offense implodes. Detroit plays a VERY aggressive style of D and we have ball handlers that have struggled this year to hold on to the rock... but typically, we excel against overly aggressive teams (see: Duke) and it's not like Detroit has elite personnel. So if Detroit gets tons of takeaways and can run fast breaks and ND struggles at faceoffs and has a bad shooting day and Kemp has a bad day they've got a chance... but that's a lot that they need. In a pre-season scrimmage, our players were just vastly more talented than those for Detroit... but Detroit has gotten better as the year went on, and we probably peaked earlier in the year before people figured out how to defend our O/attack our D. At the end of the day, in adjusted stats we have the #1 D vs. #55 (out of 63) O... so they really shouldn't be able to score on us with any kind of consistency in settled 6-on-6. And on the other side our middling (#27) O against their #23 D is a pretty even tilt that should result in us getting minimum 10 goals. I expect ND to win and for it not to be close... anything worse than 13-7 will be a sore disappointment.

7:30 - (4) Denver vs. Albany - ESPNU
This game should be ridiculous and a ton of fun. Denver plays slow but has a potent O. On D the Pioneers are extremely inept checking in at #44. Albany plays a little bit less efficient O, and a little bit more efficient D. Bottom line? If Denver plays zone and doesn't have a huge possession edge, they will get TORCHED. If they play man-to-man? Probably not a much better prognosis. Can Albany keep their legs in the altitude if they try to push tempo? Not really sure which way this game goes... don't think either team is really that good... could be a tight one or one-sided blowout for either team. We could get to 15+ goals a side or have it just over 10. In the end, I like Denver's coaching edge to probably get them through... but I'll be rooting for Albany and it wouldn't surprise me with Denver's recent terrible play if they shredded the Pioneers on their home turf.

 

[irishrb]

Awesome information LAX. I don't know what you know but here are my guesses:
UNC-Leigh
I've seen UNC play a couple of times and they moved the ball around well and played with great confidence. I saw Lehigh play UMass and they looked bad. I know they ended the year on a bit of a run but I just can't see them winning at UNC.

PSU/Yale
If it doesn't rain, we'll probably go to this. PSU's goalie is great. The guy's ritual where he adjusts his cup every 5 seconds always has my boys rollin' but it works for him. I totally expect PSU to slow this game down and win by a couple of goals.

ND-Detroit.
I want to see their offense wake up and gain some confidence for their run to the championship. I want to see Kemp play the ball better and become the dominant force he can be. I want to see ND control the faceoffs. I want to see the D suffocate the ball. I want and expect ND to win by at least 7 and continue to play with a sense of urgency...That's not asking for too much is it?

Denver-Albany
High scoring, fun affair. The way this year has gone there had to be an upset in the first round. I might as well go with this one. This game will go back and forth and Albany will win the battle.

Totally looking forward to tomorrow. GO IRISH!

 

[NDinL.A.]

Here at the game w my 19 month old. COLD!

Down 2-0 after 1. Embarrassing. Outshot 7-3.

 

[IrishLax]

Here at the game w my 19 month old. COLD!

Down 2-0 after 1. Embarrassing. Outshot 7-3.

Get in the huddle and yell at everyone for me.

 

[IrishLax]

If you guys are looking for some exciting lacrosse Denver vs. Albany is not disappointing so far on ESPNU. Love watching the Thompsons play and I always root for Native Americans.

 

[Anchorman]

Glad to see we pulled it out, but that was pathetic.

 

[IrishLax]

Glad to see we pulled it out, but that was pathetic.

Beyond pathetic. At halftime, Detroit had the ball for 21:30 to Notre Dame's 8:30... and it didn't get much better in the third (9 minutes to 6 minutes). Heading into the fourth quarter ND had a 16 minute and 30 second possession edge... or to put it another way, Detroit basically had a free 15 minute quarter and then some of having the ball entirely on offense. That's insane. And completely unacceptable.

The fourth quarter? Notre Dame held roughly a 9:45 to 5:15 possession edge. And outscored Detroit 6-0. Coincidence? I think not.

We absolutely need to have a possession emphasis next week against Duke or we might as well not get off the bus. If Fowler dominates faceoffs and we let Duke hold the ball for long possessions then the game is as good as over. Here's to hoping we go with Ossello and he brings his A+ game.

 

[IrishLax]

Quarterfinals just around the corner... crazy to think ND has been here 5 of the last 6 years and 4 straight times. Can you imagine if ND football was a top 8 team, at minimum, every single year without fail? The one year in 6 that we missed was when we went a perfect 15-0 in the regular season but got upset in the first round.

Here is a pretty good primer for the Duke-ND game... it's interesting to note that Duke never beats us with offense, they always do it with defense. In the last 6 matches Duke averages a meager 5.8 goals per game... that's a pretty large sample size and would rank dead last in the NCAA.

Swezey: Notre Dame-Duke a Study in Contrasts | InsideLacrosse.com

So what if Duke comes out and plays their hyper-aggressive D? Odds look a lot better for us... but that seems really unlikely. In our last two playoff meetings Duke played conservative shut down D and they'll probably do the same in this contest. Plus, they tend to dominate possession with Brendan Fowler at the faceoff X.

Vegas has us as a 2:1 underdog... so the silver lining is that we have a 33% chance of victory which is probably a bit more than I would have given us. To win, we'll need to score in transition and get an offensive explosion from somewhere we're not expecting. John Scioscia? Tyler Kimball? Westy Hopkins? Prepare for the worst in this one... but hope for the best.

In the other matchups, UNC should really destroy Denver but Tierney could potentially coach the Pioneers to victory. He is one of the best in the business when it comes to gameplanning. Syracuse needs to win faceoffs against Yale... if they do, they should win handily. If they don't, they might get upset. Syracuse is actually the smallest favorite of any team in this round. Cornell vs. Ohio State SHOULD be a massacre... but the Buckeyes are playing surprisingly awesome lacrosse over the last 5 games. We'll see what happens and if they try to zone Pannel & Co.

 

[irishrb]

I know absolutely NOTHING compared to LAX but I believe. After the ND/ PSU game, my boys and I hung around forever and got to talk to a lot of the players. I told a lot of them that we will accept nothing less than an appearance in the championship game and that we would see them again there. I truly believe that Duke is playing lights out better than ND. ND's offense has been downright brutal. But it's just time to take the Blue Devils down in the playoffs. I think Corrigan will make some necessary adjustments on offense...most notably playing more aggressive and playing more people. I expect the D to curb stomp Duke and allow Kemp to have a good game. IRISH 9 Devils-7

Syracuse/Yale- My youngest boy is convinced Yale beats Syracuse. I guess they made an impression on him last week. I have Syracuse in my bracket but I won't argue with him. I agree with LAX though, I don't think they will overcome another beat down with faceoffs. If they get their fair share, they will win. If they get dominated, they go down.

OSU/Cornell- Since ND is going to win, I am rooting HARD for OSU....but they just can't contain Pannel and company and disappoint me. But it will be good for ND to play someone new next week.

UNC/Denver- UNC is playing well but Denver keeps this game tight. I think this is a good game that comes down the the wire. I expect this to be entertaining and high scoring with UNC pulling it out at the end.

All in all a great weekend of Lacrosse with ND moving forward!!!!

 

[IrishLax]

Moneylines really moving in favor of ND. ND was a heavy underdog, now just +140 and the second closest projected game. Playing Duke -1.5 and ND for the outright win seems like a reallllllly good hedge. Both give + odds so you'd only lose on a Duke 1 goal victory...

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