The #4 Notre Dame Fighting Irish won their epic showdown over the Duke Blue Devils, 16-14. A furious fourth quarter comeback was a majestic end to their regular season.
This article celebrates the fantastic win over Duke. We’ll excuse ND-Atl 2.0 from his writing duties after this and deal with the elephant in the room in its own piece shortly.
The Scoring
We’ll begin as we normally do, with an account of the stat sheet. Jake Taylor led the Irish with 6 goals, with Dobson adding a fourth-quarter hat trick.
Pat Kavanagh (1g, 4a) and Quinn McCahon (2g, 2a) handled the distribution, with Chris Kavanagh adding 1g, 1a.
Harris, Mirer and Walker each added a goal, and Ricciardelli and Jackoboice each added an assist.
Liam Entenmann had 12 saves, and the face-off unit split the draws evenly with the Blue Devils. CKav (4 GBs), and PKav (3 GBs) were the tip of the ND riding spear.
The Irish were 2 of 3 man-up, with the “failed” man-up yielding a Dobson goal seconds after the penalty expired. Duke was held to 19 of 25 clearing.
It was a day for the offenses, with ND at 43.2% efficiency and Duke 40%.
26 players saw the field for the Irish.
The Plot
Wow did we see some swings in this game.
Entenmann held off an initial Duke onslaught until Jake Taylor opened the scoring half way through the first. The teams exchanged a few goals until PKav and McCahon put the Irish up 4-2 at the end of the period. Notre Dame started to look comfortable and the fans’ optimism grew.
The optimism quickly faded and the Irish gave up a disastrous 9 goals in the second quarter. A brief Irish comeback in the middle of the period leveled the scores for a moment, but a late 4 goal Blue Devil run put them up 11-7 at the half with the Irish struggling on defense.
The third quarter didn’t start well for the Irish, but they were able to stabilize the defense. The latter half of the period saw the scoring pick up again for both teams, but it was clear the Irish pressure was starting to impact the game. A late Taylor goal kept the Irish in range 14-11.
No one watching would have guessed we saw the last Duke goal.
The fourth quarter was something to behold. The Irish pressure was relentless. Dobson fired a rocket to score, followed by a Taylor man-up goal. Suddenly the Irish were only down one, and soon after tied on another Taylor goal (Chris Kavanaugh assist).
Momentum was clearly on the side of the Irish with a packed Arlotta house behind them in support. The Dobson launched another for the lead, and then one more to put the Irish clear of the struggling Duke offense.
The Irish did not sit back and kept up the pressure. Duke was never able to get a organized possession, and the Irish were able to somewhat comfortably kill off the final few minutes for a well-earned win.
What we learned
We have said all season that the Irish effort as measured in ground balls and riding success was a special feature of this team. In this game, it became a superpower. Despite getting beat up in the second quarter, the Irish were able to pivot and apply incredible pressure without the risk of a 10-man ride. There haven’t been a lot of teams in recent memory that can do this.
Coach Corrigan’s patience with the faceoff unit paid off! A 50% day against the excellent Jake Naso was a continuation of the consistent upward trendline.
The offense was indeed multiple. Dodging threats from every part of the filed. An inside closer. Assist threats from all points on the compass. Dominant shooting from range. Two effective midfield lines. This offense made it nearly impossible for opponents to game plan without accepting that they could not close out the bulk of the scoring threats. And a transition threat developed alongside their settled attack.
This group came a long way, and it was a pleasure to watch.
News!!
The Premier Lacrosse League held its college draft Tuesday evening, and our Irish were part of the key selections.
- Arden Cohen was selected by the Redwoods with the 3rd pick of the 1st round. Arden joins a host of fellow Domers on the ‘Woods, and particularly the heavily Irish defense of Glazener, Epple, Landis, Sexton, Crance and Near led by Coach Nat St. Laurent.
- Wheaton Jackoboice was selected by the Whipsnakes with the 7th pick of the 2nd round. Coach Stagnitta sees the same ability in the Irish captain that we have.
- Jason Reynolds was selected by the Waterdogs with the 6th pick 0f the 4th round. It would be hard for the PLL teams to ignore Reynold’s fantastic success on the Irish defense this year.
Congrats to our new Fighting Irish in the PLL!
#GoIrish
The fact that they missed out on the tourney for OSU and Harvard is a bit insulting, even with the heads up loss to OSU. Apparently Lacrosse doesn’t have a strong recency bias like Football.
It was quite impressive to see them when six in a row with UNC and Duke being in that mix.
A couple of the guys on the ESPN selection show were outraged that ND was omitted from the playoff field. They felt ND was one of the 4-5 teams with actual NC capabilities.
I’ll wait for the agony, thanks much. Harumph.
That is exactly what the piece is called. It’s been a struggle finding the words.