Film Room Focus: Why Liberty Won

By: E.J. Freeman | MCLA.us

ATLANTA, GA-  In this installment of our Film Room Focus series we take a look at last season's DI National Championship game.

Check our our previous installment here.

Why did Liberty win the National Championship last year?

The obvious answer is that they were the best team.  This is true, but does not really answer the question.  There are a few easy things to latch on to that were massive parts of the Flames’ identity all season and one could easily assume those things were the keys to them winning the championship game.

They won because they had Keaton Mohs, national player of the year.  Mohs had five points in the final on one goal and four assists.  At first glance you might accept this answer, but as good as Mohs was in that game, his only goal was an empty netter at the end of the game.  The five points he scored was less than his season average of nearly 6.5 points per game and a far cry from the absurd 10 points per game he was averaging through the first three games of the tournament.

They won because they had Caleb Hammett, first team All-America face off man.  Hammett was under 50% in the final game.  It was the only game all season in which he lost more than ten faceoffs. 

They won because of their vaunted 10-man ride.  The Yellow Jackets cleared at right around their season average of 80%.

So, why did the Flames win if these three pillars of their style of play weren’t the catalysts?

Studying the film, I’d argue that the Flames won because they were able to take advantage of any mistake their opponent made no matter how small it was. 

One step out of position? A skip pass buzzes past you to an open shooter for a great look.

Miss a first time ground ball?  Chances are the Flames aren’t letting you get a second crack at it.

Miss a wide open finish?  The ball is probably going the other way now.

This ability to take advantage of an opponent’s smallest mistakes adds to the already immense pressure teams feel when playing the Flames, which in turn leads to more small mistakes.

You can see this at the end of the first quarter.  Through the first fourteen minutes of the quarter, Georgia Tech had several high quality scoring chances, but failed to finish and their defense had held Liberty to one goal on six possessions or 16.67% efficiency.  The Flames scored two goals in ten seconds to take a lead of 3-2 to close the first quarter.  The first goal on a fast break after the Jackets had a high quality look inside that missed the cage.  Peyton Park then took the ball away and started a break that Liberty scored on after hitting the trailer.  Hammett took the following faceoff forward for another fast break goal.  A few small mistakes led to a massive change in the momentum of the game.

Early in the second quarter  Georgia Tech has a great chance to tie the game at 14:02, but Flames goalie Ian Carvajal makes a tremendous save on the low shot.  On the ensuing possession Hunter Rockhill drives down the alley and the Georgia Tech defense is probably two steps too high and a step too low on the backside creating a lane and Rockhill fires a feed to Luke Campbell who finishes the backside midrange shot.

Let’s be clear here, Liberty does an awful lot to push their opponents into making these mistakes.  On the clip above there are two cutters that distract the backside defenders leading to them being slightly out of position, which leads to the lane for the skip pass.

On the following clip Mohs ends up covered by shortstick.  This would set off alarm bells for every defense in the country.  Georgia Tech makes the mistake of sliding with two guys here.  They send a coma slide which is arriving from across the crease and three off ball defenders are rotating to cover for that.  However, they also send an adjacent slide to Mohs' face and the secondary rotations cannot support both a coma slide and an adjacent slide.  Mohs makes the relatively simple read of throwing the ball up the line to Rockhill and the Tech defense cannot rotate to it as they were anticipating the coma slide.  Rockhill takes advantage of the step down shot with his hands free and stick to the middle giving the Flames an 8-4 lead heading into halftime.

In the third quarter Georgia Tech fought and clawed their way back to within one at 9-8.  After a long but fruitless possession for the Jackets, the Flames get the ball on their offensive end.  Keaton Mohs gets the ball behind again.  This time Mohs is dodging against a close defenseman, but the Jackets are still uncomfortable.  They send an adjacent defender again, but just as before, the rest of the defense is not ready to support that slide and the shooter has his hands free with his stick to the middle and makes the Jackets pay.

On the ensuing faceoff, Georgia Tech had two chances to pick up the ball and get it cleared, but could not maintain possession.  Eventually, the Flames got the ball.  A Yellow Jacket attackman went just offsides in the ride as he could not quite stop himself before the midfield line.  The Flames in turn scored on the ensuing extra man opportunity.  Three seemingly small mistakes that the Flames were able to exploit and turn into a massive goal extending a one goal lead to three in short order.

This ability to force mistakes and take advantage of them is not a quality reserved for the Flames’ offense.  Liberty’s defense did the same thing.  In the clip below, Pierce Quarles gets underneath and beats his man creating a look for himself that he has scored on numerous times throughout his career, but he hangs his stick ever so slightly as he tries to finish.  Brody Ashworth does not concede an inch to Quarles and lands a trail check that gets just enough of Quarles’ stick to dislodge the ball erasing a great scoring opportunity for the Jackets.

Being able to capitalize on any mistake their opponents made, the Flames were able to win despite Georgia Tech seemingly limiting the impact of three core pieces of the Flame's identity throughout the season.  The Flames are the reigning champs because they were good enough to take advantage of the Yellow Jackets' mistakes even though plan A may not have gone as expected; one of the marks of a great team.