I just wanted to write a quick note
here as we're heading out on our spring trip this morning.
On Wednesday we had a nice win over
your typical tough/athletic Springfield squad 11-7. We jumped on them
early and went up 6-1 by the end of the 1st quarter. Springfield started
out in man to man on defense and switched things up about halfway through the
2nd quarter. From there on out we only managed one more 6v6 goal and with
Conn in the stands scouting there was little doubt that we'd see a zone defense
against the Camels.
Yesterday's contest ended
up being a great NESCAC lacrosse game. Both teams came to play and
Conn gave us all we could handle. For those of you who were at our 3-2
game with them last year, this one looked nothing like what went on in New
London. They came out firing and took 15 shots in the 1st quarter and it
looked like we were in for a long day. We had some very good looks
against the zone early but their goalie came up with a few big saves before Tom
Petty finally ripped a 3/4 high to low shot to the goalie's
off stick low side. Tom's goal evened things up 1-1 and then Pete Britt
threw a dart to Matt Virtue who looked like he was running a skinny post up the
middle of the field. Virtue would find Matt Ferrer
on the doorstep in transition to give us a 2-1 lead.
Our defense settled in and limited
them to only 18 more shots the rest of the way and Pete Britt came up with a
few jaw dropping saves to allow us to build a bit of a cushion.
Offensively we generated some great looks against the zone all day long but we
need to shoot the ball better than we did yesterday. Their goalie also
made some excellent saves and didn't give us anything easy.
The most promising thing coming
out of the game yesterday was the tenacity we showed on ground balls and in the
riding game. We've gotten back to playing with the kind of relentless
pressure that we want to put on the opposing team in the middle
of the field.
Time to get ready for W&L on
Tuesday, for those of you who don't know we'll be playing them at Catholic
University in Washington DC at 4:30pm.