Rearview: Clearing Up

Photo by Alex Ray

By: E.J. Freeman | MCLA.us   

ATLANTA- At this point in the season we are starting to get a full picture of who teams are; things can change and teams can get hot or cold down the stretch, but in general I think teams for the most part have shown us who they are.

Brigham Young looked every bit the part of a top team in Knoxville.  They took care of Auburn and Liberty with relative ease in their first two games.  In their finale against Tennessee, they build a relatively large lead before Tennessee came roaring back to bring the game to its 12-10 final score. 

Tennessee, the weekend hosts, came out of the event with a 2-1 record.  Their win against Liberty was incremental in that they won each quarter by one or two goals en route to their five-goal margin.  Against Auburn, they broke open a one-goal game with a 7-0 second quarter and then exploded for six more in the fourth quarter.  Against Brigham Young, it looked like the Cougars might run away with another one; but the Vols stormed back in the fourth quarter to make Brigham Young sweat it out at the end. 

Auburn walked out of their first two games of the weekend with some good things to point to despite the two losses.  Their Saturday game against Liberty would determine if the Tigers could get something out of the weekend record wise or if they just let it slip through their fingers.  The Tigers wasted no time in answering the question of how they’d approach the weekend finale taking an 8-0 lead after the first quarter.  Faceoff specialist Aidan Garrett seems to be the determining factor for the Tigers.   Against Brigham Young and Tennessee,  the Tigers, without Garrett, were under 50% for the day.  Against Liberty Auburn, with Garrett back, won 70% of the faceoffs.  If you can combine faceoff dominance with a strong offense and play make it-take it lacrosse, it can be demoralizing; especially against a team that is reeling as the Flames are.  As well as Auburn has played of late, they are still in a precarious position in the SouthEastern Lacrosse Conference (SELC) South race.  Central Florida has wins over Auburn and Florida at this point and looks to be sitting pretty for a playoff spot with their only region loss having come against Florida State and only a game against Jacksonville left on the schedule, in which the Knights will be heavy favorites.  Florida State, despite their top-five status in the poll, is not a lock for the SELC tournament either as they still have a region game against Florida.  Auburn has their win over Florida State, but still must play Florida next week.  The playoff picture will likely not be completely settled until April 4 and will likely involve some tiebreakers.

Liberty leaves Knoxville with no wins, having lost all three games while giving up nearly 21 goals per game.  The Flames were competitive facing off against Tennessee and were able to keep  that game close, but against Brigham Young and Auburn the Flames were dominated at the faceoff dot and it showed on the scoreboard.  In addition to the faceoff struggles, the Flames’ ten-man ride does not have the same bite that it had a year ago.  It seems as though teams are breaking it and getting high quality transition opportunities just as often if not more so than the Flames are creating chaos in the middle of the field.  The Flames are still scoring at a decent clip, but not enough to keep pace with the avalanche of goals that have been coming at them recently.  The Flames still  have their win over South Carolina in their pocket, but as the losses (especially those of the blowout variety) mount, will that be enough?  The Flames still have games against Clemson and Virginia Tech in the Atlantic Lacrosse Conference (ALC) race, but something has to change otherwise those two games will  be long days for the Flames as well.

Chapman took their trip to Colorado this weekend and surely expected to come out with two wins as both Colorado and Colorado State had been struggling.   Against the Buffaloes, Chapman gave up 12 goals allowing the Colorado to tie their highest scoring output of the season.  The Panthers only managed to score six goals of their own allowing their hosts to ride a 6-0 second quarter to the win.  The Panthers had a day to regroup before taking on Colorado State.  Chapman led at halftime, but could not keep pace in the second half as the Rams got the 19-15 win.  The 19 goals were a season high for the Rams.  The Panthers now find themselves limping into Southwest Lacrosse Conference (SLC) play.  San Diego State meanwhile picked up two wins against the Colorado schools on their first trip east of Arizona in recent memory.

On the Division II side, St. Thomas once again played the part of the top team, running away from North Dakota State and leading 13-4 after three quarters  before allowing them to go on a run in the fourth quarter to bring the final to 16-10.  The Tommies will power down for the next two weeks before playing Grand Valley State.

Speaking of the Lakers, they have finally played three games and now become poll eligible.  The Lakers lost against Division I Michigan State, but rolled in their two Division II games against High Point and Virginia Tech DII.  The Lakers will be making up for lost time playing six games over the next three weeks.

Cal State San Marcos got a conference win over Arizona Christian 10-5, which was a little closer than expected.  The Cougars made up for it against Northern Arizona with a 28-3 the next day.  The Cougars must keep their focus going forward even though they only have one ranked opponent left in the regular season.

Florida Atlantic picked up a big SELC South win over Miami.  The Owls rode a 3-0 third quarter to the 12-10 win.  The win puts the Owls in  a prime spot for the SELC playoffs. 

Picker Results

Thanks to Aidan Smith for jumping into the hot seat and picking games. Aidan went 3-2 and his Hokies got a nice win over Boston College.

Guest Picker Leaderboard:

Ryan Kerr, Brian Barnhill 5-0

Dylan Hess, Tim Haslam, Ethan Zwickey 4–1

Chris Marshall, Aidan Smith 3-2

J.J. Arminio 2–3

Fan Vote Upset of the Week

I think most people outside of Boulder would have agreed with the 80% of fans who picked Chapman against Colorado, but those people would have been wrong.  Congratulations to Colorado for getting the 12-6 win and the Fan Vote Upset of the Week.

Quick Sticks

Virginia Tech went up to Boston and got two wins against Boston College and Northeastern.  The Friday night win over the Eagles in Alumni Stadium was an impressive statement as the Hokies grounded the Boston College giving them their first loss this season behind a 10-6 first half lead.  The Hokies flirted with a weekend split trailing Northeastern 8-6 after three quarters before closing on a 5-0 run to win 11-6.  The Hokies will host Clemson on Friday night in what should be a fascinating game with ALC playoff ramifications.

South Carolina locked up the SELC North in Division I with a 14-11 win over Georgia on Friday night.  The Gamecocks won the fourth quarter 4-1 to take the game.  The Gamecocks now have bye to the conference semifinals in Jacksonville.  The Bulldogs still have to play Alabama, but it appears that their game against Georgia Tech will decide second and third place in the region with the winner getting a home quarterfinal game and the loser hitting the road.  A loss will be expensive for either team both in the standings and in travel costs.

Virginia Tech DII picked up a nice win against Central Michigan who had been ranked.  It seems the young Hokies might be starting to gel despite their loss to Grand Valley State.  After a strong start, Central Michigan dropped games to both High Point and Virginia Tech DII.  The Chippewas have games against Dayton and Grand Valley State coming up and need to regain their early season form. 

 Arizona took down Texas A&M as two of the nation’s point leaders faced off.  Matthew Bechtold was held to three points while linemate Gunnar Hynden had seven points for the Wildcats.

In an era when most teams are built on offense Sonoma State is taking a different tack.  The Sea Wolves are playing a suffocating brand of defense and clamped down Oregon’s high flying attack over the weekend.  With most teams focused on goal outputs can the Sea Wolves drag some opponents down into the mud with them and force them out of their comfort zone?  Expect the Sea Wolves to be dangerous in the Western Collegiate Lacrosse League playoffs.

Wake Forest is currently ranked #12 in the Division II poll, but has been sort of quietly chugging along and added two convincing wins this week.   The Demon Deacons look to be the leaders in the ALC North while UNC-Wilmington and Coastal Carolina look to be the class of the ALC South.

As always, head coaches get me your PEARL Goalie of the Week and Warrior Player of the Week nominations by noon local time Monday.