MLax: (ACCT Final) Syracuse 14, Duke 8

[DangerDevil]

Let's blame it on the alternate field

[burnspbesq]

Ugh. Final score 14-8. Cuse was on EMO out of the restart, and scored with 15 seconds. Myles hit the post on the ensuing Duke possession, and it just snowballed. Cuse made all the hustle plays.

Dang.

[Native]

14-8 'Cuse is your final.

Tough to come out and play after such a long delay like that.

We got the win we needed in the semifinals against ND. If we take care of business against BU we should be in good shape to get in the NCAAT.

Hats off to the Orange, especially their keeper Molloy. Big-time game from him.

[nmduke2001]

That restart was rough. The last two games they really struggled with clearing. I bet they failed to clear 7 times today.

[Doria]

That restart was rough. The last two games they really struggled with clearing. I bet they failed to clear 7 times today.

Sure seemed that way. It was hard to tell what was going on at times in those last few minutes on my phone. Still, it was cool they did a periscope.

[84crazy]

When the delay occurred I got bad vibes. Seems like every restart of play we struggle for a long while then close strong. 65% of games fumbling/bumbling 35% pure beauty.

[captmojo]

ESPN deserves whatever award is given for pathetic reporting on this match.

I was glad to get to watch. I was okay with the wait while Mother Nature did her thing.

I was NOT cool with the network giving me false info about the status of the game, the false relay to me that the re-start would be at a particular time and on a particular channel. I was not cool with them dropping the coverage and their updates, including even from the scrolling, bottom line.

It's enough to make you want to turn to someone else to be the worldwide leader.

[DST Fan]

Let's blame it on the alternate field

Today was sort of reminiscent of the 2008 SEC Men's Basketball Tournament in Atlanta.

[cspan37421]

Tough to come out and play after such a long delay like that.

Not for Syracuse, apparently.

[JasonEvans]

If we take care of business against BU we should be in good shape to get in the NCAAT.

Is LAX the only sport where the conference tournament is not the end of the regular season? Post-conference games before the NCAA tourney? Whaaaat?

[burnspbesq]

Is LAX the only sport where the conference tournament is not the end of the regular season? Post-conference games before the NCAA tourney? Whaaaat?

Only the ACC and Patriot League play their tournaments "a week early." The other eight conference tournaments are this week, mostly Thursday - Saturday. Best games to watch on Thursday are Villanova - Marquette in the Big East, Yale - Penn in the Ivy, and Richmond - High Point in SoCon.

There are three ACC vs. Patriot games this weekend: Cuse - Colgate, ND - Army, and Duke - BU.

[Billy Dat]

I DVRed the game, even added 30 minutes, and was forced to look-up the result circa 10PM when my "tape ran out". Bummer.

In the pre-weather-delay portion of the game, it seemed like the ball was on the turf an awful lot for a D1 contest and guys were having trouble vacuuming it up, I was astonished by the number of ground balls we failed to secure that were on our stick without challenge. It also felt like a more lethal offense could have shredded our defense, they had a lot of catch and shoot opportunities where our closest man was 2-3 feet away and Syracuse didn't pull the trigger as many times as they could have. We also had a few point-blank chances that we didn't put into the back of the net, and they got some flukey bounces (like that shot off the pipe that went right into their stick in front of the cage for an easy score). It felt like they were dominating the face-offs but the box score shows me that it was pretty even prior to the restart. But, I think I have been spoiled by recent past years...I am glad this group pulled together and got big wins over the past few weeks and I look forward to watching the remaining games.

[MCFinARL]

I DVRed the game, even added 30 minutes, and was forced to look-up the result circa 10PM when my "tape ran out". Bummer.

In the pre-weather-delay portion of the game, it seemed like the ball was on the turf an awful lot for a D1 contest and guys were having trouble vacuuming it up, I was astonished by the number of ground balls we failed to secure that were on our stick without challenge. It also felt like a more lethal offense could have shredded our defense, they had a lot of catch and shoot opportunities where our closest man was 2-3 feet away and Syracuse didn't pull the trigger as many times as they could have. We also had a few point-blank chances that we didn't put into the back of the net, and they got some flukey bounces (like that shot off the pipe that went right into their stick in front of the cage for an easy score). It felt like they were dominating the face-offs but the box score shows me that it was pretty even prior to the restart. But, I think I have been spoiled by recent past years...I am glad this group pulled together and got big wins over the past few weeks and I look forward to watching the remaining games.

Agree Duke didn't seem to do well on the ground balls yesterday. I don't know how much of that might have been related to a particular field and how much it is just a weakness of theirs; in the ND game they won ground balls, although that was deceptive since most of it was their decisive success on face-offs.

It did seem like Duke just failed to come back out after the delay. Syracuse coach Desko actually commented specifically that he was very pleasantly surprised by his team's post-delay performance, as he expected them to be flat but they were ready to go.

Re face-offs, they were indeed pretty even prior to the restart, and some that Duke lost involved Rowe winning initially but Duke failing to secure the ground ball.

Something to feel good about--despite the late breakdown, the Duke defense continues to look much better than earlier in the year, and Danny Fowler is dramatically improved. Even after the 5-goal mess at the end, he had 17 saves to 14 goals against on the day, a respectable if not earth-shaking 55%. I was very glad to see he made the all-tournament team (along with Evan Molloy--so 2 goalies).

[Doria]

Since I've now seen a grand total of two lacrosse games, can someone assess for me our faceoff and goaltending skills respectively? I feel that we're reasonably good at both, despite the end of yesterday's game, but I just don't have enough experience to really know. Thanks, in advance.

[MCFinARL]

Since I've now seen a grand total of two lacrosse games, can someone assess for me our faceoff and goaltending skills respectively? I feel that we're reasonably good at both, despite the end of yesterday's game, but I just don't have enough experience to really know. Thanks, in advance.

Others more expert feel free to jump in here, but I think it is fair to say that, in general, Duke's face-off game is very good and its goal tending just okay--but if you are looking at just the last few games there has been a significant uptick in goaltending, as Danny Fowler seems to have taken a big leap (and the fact that the defense in front of him leaves him vulnerable a little less often doesn't hurt either).

Currently Kyle Rowe, the FOGO, is ranked 10th in Division I in face-off percentage, with the only face-off from the ACC who is ahead of him being Ben Williams of Syracuse.

Danny Fowler is 30th in save percentage, with a .522 average. The 30th ranking may be a little deceptive, as only players who have played 60% of their team's minutes in goal are listed. One player who isn't listed for that reason--Evan Molloy of Syracuse, who as a .566 save percentage. Don't know whether he was injured or came on to replace another goalie but he has less than half of Syracuse's minutes in goal. But Fowler's stats in recent games are better: 55% against Syracuse, 57% against Notre Dame, over 85% against Marquette (a bit of an outlier), 62% against Virginia.

[msdukie]

Is LAX the only sport where the conference tournament is not the end of the regular season? Post-conference games before the NCAA tourney? Whaaaat?

There have been times where both Duke and UNC WBB have each played a regular season non-conference game against a very winnable opponent after the ACC Tournament as there is an extra week before Selection Monday to keep sharp. But of late we haven't done that.

[burnspbesq]

Latest update to RPI has Duke at 10. Probably safely in the tournament, but you never know until you see your name on the board.

http://www.ncaa.com/rankings/lacross...s-lacrosse-rpi

[duke2x]

Thanks for the link.

Inside lacrosse has Duke @ Hop (#8 seed) in its latest bracketology. Hop has to play its Big 10 tournament games yet, however. They beat PSU in overtime and lost to Rutgers (1st up) and Maryland. The numerical difference between Duke and Hop is small enough that Hop should fall behind us in RPI if they lose either game. To make a long story short (too late), I still think we might have a small chance of another game at Koskinen Stadium if we beat BU. See link below at Laxpower for frequent RPI updates for this weekend.

http://laxpower.com/update16/binmen/rpi01.php

[burnspbesq]

One big upset tonight.

Vermont rode a 17-save performance by Jon Kaplan to a 10-9 win over Stony Brook in the America East semis. That eliminates the possibility of SB upsetting Albany and popping somebody's bubble (huge sigh of relief in Cheater Hill).

As I write this, Marquette has a three-goal lead on Nova in Q4.

[burnspbesq]

Final score Marquette 14, Villanova 9.

Albany just scored two in a row to take a 10-8 lead on Hartford with about five minutes to go.