The Weekend That Was (Updated)
The semifinals are set for Saturday.
No. 3 Syracuse vs. No. 2 Virginia, noon
No. 5 Johns Hopkins vs. No. 1 Duke, 2:30
Here's a look at some of the games over the weekend.
*Did Notre Dame Have Prom on Saturday Night?
In the first half of its quarterfinal against Syracuse, it looked like every ND player but senior G Joey Kemp (Georgetown Prep) and his stick head with the Irish flag's colors had been out doing something the night before. Kemp had 11 saves in the first half and helped keep the Irish within 6-2.
In the third quarter, Kemp continued playing well and his teammates finally caught up. ND was 6 for 8 shooting and it led until the game's final 6 minutes 23 seconds.
*Rare Freshman Goalie in the Semifinals
Syracuse freshman G John Galloway is aiming to become the fourth fifth true freshman to start for a national champion.
Rodney Rullman, UVa, 1972
Kevin Mahon, Johns Hopkins, 1974*
Quint Kessenich, Johns Hopkins, 1987
Derek Kenney, UVa, 1999
(Jay Pfeifer was a redshirt freshman when SU won the title in 2002.)
*Thanks to "Chris," probably Chris Tsien of the Blue Jay Bananas, for reminding us of Mahon. According to Bob Scott's Lacrosse: Technique and Tradition book, Mahon was a freshman and his first varsity game was a victory over Maryland in the regular season finale in 1974. He also played in the title game, won by JHU.
*Virginia's Zone Defense
Virginia used more zone defense on Saturday than it had all year, according to Coach Dom Starsia. Why?
Maryland put its big midfielders on the top line--juniors Jeremy Sieverts, Jeff Reynolds and Dan Groot. On the second line was put the smaller guys--senior Max Ritz, junior Drew Evans and freshman Tony Mendes.
The alignment was done by Coach Dave Cottle to force Virginia either to take a longstick off freshman Travis Reed or to put shortsicks on the more physical runners like Sieverts and Reynolds and/or to fast runners like Mendes.
Sieverts and Reynolds scored in the first half--Reynolds off a faceoff, Sieverts after he beat sophomore SSDM Mike Thompson. Sieverts had a couple other very good looks against the SSDMs. And after SSDM Will Barrow was beaten on a goal by sophomore LSM Brian Farrell late in the 2nd quarter, Virginia went to its countermove: A zone defense.
Initially, UVa went to the zone after timeouts. (It's an old basketball trick.) As the game wore on, though, it went zone more and more.
"I kept asking the guys in the huddle what they liked," Starsia said. "And they were saying zone."
The defense was a brilliant move. It put the pressure back on Maryland's young attackmen to be patient. After the goal by Sieverts, Maryland finished the game 2 for 22 shooting; both goals were by Farrell.
*Johns Hopkins Hits Early Home Run
For a few weeks in this space we have been talking about how the Johns Hopkins offense takes what the defense gives it.
Early against Navy, however, the Blue Jays went for the home run: They attacked the matchup between their best offensive player, Paul Rabil, and Navy's best defender, Jordan DiNola.
On the second possession, Rabil went past DiNola, used a swim move past the slide defender and eluded one more defender before he scored on a close shot for a 1-0 lead.
I was surprised at the ease with which Rabil scored. Because in the past, DiNola had done well in that matchup. In a 10-9 loss in the regular season last year, Rabil had one goal in three quarters against DiNola. His final two goals came after DiNola left the game with cramps.
In the regular season meeting this year, Johns Hopkins made it hard for DiNola to find Rabil. Before Rabil came onto the field, the attackman DiNola was guarding while waiting for Rabil went to the opposite end of the offensive box; that forced DiNola to follow and made one of the LSMs defend Rabil.
In the end, they matched up twice. Once Rabil threw the ball away, the other possession was a wash.
On Saturday, Rabil finished with three goals and an assist.
*Duke Shooting
The Blue Devils were 21 for 50 (42 percent) in their win over Ohio State. I lost count of how many of their goals either were to the corner or were off-hip on OSU's goalie, but it was at least 13. There were a couple bounce shots for goals, too. The Hopkins defense had better be ready.
By Christian Swezey |
May 19, 2008; 10:01 AM ET
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Posted by: Chris | May 19, 2008 11:01 AM
Wasn't Tillman Johnson a Freshman when Virginia won it in 2003?
Posted by: FS | May 19, 2008 11:04 AM
In the MD/UVa game, I noticed Maryland had much more success in the first half, I think largely due to their ground ball work. On at least five occasions, MD picked up tough ground balls in traffic to continue a possession. Although none of them led directly to goals, the Terps had longer possessions and kept the Hoos off the board.
That wasn't true as much in the second half ... perhaps due to the zone defense (with all their players in the middle, UVa got to the ball quicker and could box out the Terps).
Posted by: Incredulous | May 19, 2008 11:57 AM
@Chris:
I believe Christian meant a freshman goalie starting in the NC game and winning, not just in any game during a NC season.
Posted by: Incredulous | May 19, 2008 12:00 PM
Thank you Incredulous. Yeah, I meant freshman starting goalies on teams that won the national title.
Tillman Johnson was a junior when his team won in 2003.
However, he does have a rarity for a freshman: He beat Johns Hopkins. By my count, since Scott Bacigalupo in 1991, only a handful of freshman goalies have beaten Hopkins--Galloway and Adam Ghitelman this year, Johnson in '01 (18 saves in a 4-OT win) and Derek Kenney in 1999.
(SU's Peter Collucini was a redshirt freshman for the 2006 playoff win over JHU.)
Posted by: Christian | May 19, 2008 12:12 PM
UMD turned the ball over a good four or five times on bad passes - that seemed to make a meaningful difference, giving UVA additional possessions they otherwise might not have had.
Posted by: CSH | May 19, 2008 3:45 PM
To CSH:
Exactly my point. I remember in particular when freshman Ryan Young threw the ball away on the final possession of regulation. And freshman Grant Catalino threw the ball away on the possession in overtime.
Again, UVa forced the freshmen to be patient. And look what happened.
Posted by: Christian | May 19, 2008 4:18 PM
No! Tillman Johnson was not a freshman when UVa beat Hopkins in 2003. And speaking of Hopkins -- Team Asterisk is so friggin' scary I don't want JHU to even play them on Saturday! Seriously, I don't know what Petro has up his sleeve to slow that Durham team down.
Posted by: patrick | May 19, 2008 5:37 PM
Incredulous:
In 1974 Hopkins started Mike Godack in goal. Godack played through the loss to Navy (made 14 saves), but was replaced in goal by a freshman, Elf, for the next game, Maryland. Godack never regained his starting position.
Posted by: Chris | May 19, 2008 7:52 PM
Incredulous
Sorry, I hit send prematurely.
Maryland was ranked #1 when Mahon took the stage and it was the last game of the regular season. Hopkins won 17-13. From there, it went
JHU 18 Hofstra 10 (QFinal)
JHU 11 W&L 10 (SFinal)
JHU 17 Md 12 (Final)
All with Mahon in goal.
Posted by: Chris | May 19, 2008 8:02 PM
@Chris
My bad. I was negative three then, so I hope you understand my poor memory J
Posted by: Incredulous | May 19, 2008 9:59 PM
Apologies on Tillman, I must be losing my mind or something. It's great to actually have a resource at a major newspaper that knows their stuff.
Posted by: FS | May 19, 2008 11:26 PM
The comments to this entry are closed.
The Blue Jays inserted freshman Kevin Mahon (aka The Elf) in the goal (if memory serves, I believe for the regular season game against Maryland), in 1974.