The #2 Notre Dame Fighting Irish men’s lacrosse team (4-0) travelled to #4 Maryland (3-2) and left with a 13-12 win after three overtime periods! It was an epic battle with a Hollywood ending.

The Plot

This game had a little bit of everything.

The Irish won the opening faceoff but weren’t able to convert it into a scoring opportunity.  The teams traded possessions with Notre Dame looking a bit unsettled. They were having difficulty with the ball and facing a barrage of Terp shots.  Maryland got on the scoreboard first on a goal by Owen Murphy assisted by Daniel Maltz.

Notre Dame responded with three goals on three shots (Tevlin, CKav and McCahon) to take the lead. The Irish responded to their opponent’s volume shooting with ruthless efficiency.

Tough penalties on Harris and Conlin resulted in two Maryland man-up goals sandwiched around a Terp even-strength goal, given the opponent a 4-3 lead to end the first quarter.  Maryland outshot the Irish 19-5 in that frame.

Goalie Liam Entenmann and the Notre Dame defense got matters organized and shut out Maryland in the second quarter, while the offense regained the lead on goals by Walker and Tevlin. The teams entered halftime with the Irish up 5-4.

The pace picked up quickly in the second half.  Lynch began winning faceoffs more consistently for Notre Dame, but Maryland was nonetheless able to retake the lead 6-5. Eric Dobson responded almost instantaneously, followed by a pair of goals by Jack Simmons to put the Irish back up 8-6.

As soon as Notre Dame established a bit of momentum, Maryland responded with three goals to retake the lead and finish the third quarter up 9-8. The level of effort by both teams to this point was beyond extraordinary.

The fourth quarter began with a CKav goal to tie the game.  In the next possession, PKav looked to feed his brother streaking to the crease but the pass sailed through. Luckily, it found the waiting stick of Quinn McCahon, who hammered home the goal to give the Irish the 10-9 lead.

Maryland was not ready to give up.  The responded with two goals to regain the lead. Both teams dailed up their defensive pressure and exchanged scoreless possessions until Daniel Maltz scored his second for the Terps to give them them a 12-10 lead with only 3:50 left in the game.

Normally, one would add a “things look bleak for the Irish” cliche, but any fan watching this team this season knew things were far from over for the Irish.  Lynch won the following faceoff settling the Irish into an offensive possession. Reilly Gray used a high Jack Simmons pick and drove straight for the cage for a goal to bring Notre Dame to within one.

A wild ground ball scrum on the next faceoff resulted in a Notre Dame possession. A good PKav shot went just wide, but the Irish retained possession and continued to probe the Maryland defense.  The ball rotated to CKav, who willed his way past All-American defender Ajax Zapitello for an incredible diving goal to tie the game at 12!

Lynch won another faceoff to give the Irish a last possession to try to win in regulation, but the boys were unable to get a good look.  A nervous final possession by Maryland with 17 seconds left ended with a turnover as Tevlin disrupted the Terp dodger and Napolitano secured the ground ball to run out the clock.

OVERTIME!

Overtime in college lacrosse is sudden death.  Wierman won the opening faceoff for Maryland. Great Notre Dame defense led to a fairly quick turnover, and the boys advanced the ball up field.  Dobson was able to draw some attention and got the ball to Ricciardelli deep in the interior, but the slick low-to-high shot by Agent Zero was turned away by the Maryland goalie to keep them alive. The Irish defense once again generated a turnover on the Maryland possession.

The Maryland goalie made another brilliant save, this time on a PKav shot. The Irish collapsed on the Maryland attack almost immediately and got the ball on the ground again to neutralize the last possession of the first overtime.

SECOND OVERTIME!!

Weirman won the opening faceoff again to give the Terps the first possession. Once again, the Irish were all over the Maryland attack, who were only saved by a huge timeout by their coach. They got a few quality shots off before Tevlin was once again able to dislodge the ball and gain possession for the Irish.

A point-plank CKav shot was saved, with the Irish slowing a potential fast-break coming the other way.  The Irish defended a few point-blank opportunities as well before earning a shot clock violation.  A nervous failed clear going back spiked anxiety for a moment, but the clock ran on the second overtime period.

THIRD OVERTIME!!!

Weirman won the opening faceoff for Maryland again. The Irish defense remained highly focused and disruptive. The Terps, perhaps in frustration, forced a pass into the interior which fell harmlessly to the turf and was secured by Fake and Entenmann.

The Irish called timeout on the offensive end, and Coach Corrigan made a brilliant adjustment for the next play: he inserted 2022 leading scorer Jake Taylor, who was coming off an injury and had not seen the field yet this season for the Irish. One of Taylor’s superpowers is subtly disrupting the defense. Just enough to create a pinch of space, but not so much to generate a slide or other reaction. On the broadcast, Taylor wasn’t even in the huddle until the very end. We like to believe this was part of the ruse.

Coming out of the timeout, the Irish rotated the ball to PKav, who is covered tight by All-American Brett Makar. PKav drifts to his right around a casual high pick set by Taylor that gets Makar off by a half step at most. PKav switches directions and to his left hand, and begins a probing dodge to his left across the top of the field.  PKav patiently waits for Taylor’s defender to follow #13 out of the play, hits the afterburners, gains a full step on Makar, then an overhand left-hander, 5-hole, BALLGAME.


The Scoring

Chris Kavanagh led goal scorers with a hat trick, including the game-tying effort. McCahon, Simmons and Tevlin had 2 goals each. Pat Kavanagh had a goal and 2 assists, Dobson and Gray each with 1 goal, 1 assist, and Walker with 1 goal.

Eric Spanos led Maryland with 3 goals.

Liam Entenmann had 14 save on 26 shots on goal (54%).  LSM Jose Boyer had an impressive stat line on defense with 2 caused turnovers and 4 ground balls patrolling the middle of the field. PKav added two ground balls in support of his CityLax cause.

Will Lynch won 11 of 30 draws (37%), with Hagstrom making one appearance in relief.  11/31 undercount the results, as the wings did a good job of winning the ball back, blunting the Terp possession advantage significantly.

Maryland, on the strength of their first quarter shooting gallery, greatly outshot the Irish, 55 to 39.  However, shots on goal were a far more even 26-25.

Notre Dame had another challenging day clearing the ball, going 22 of 28, with a number of offsides mixed in.

In the aggregate, the Irish were far more careful with the ball, with 14 turnovers to Maryland’s 20.  Maryland did a pretty good job doubling Dobson leading to 4 turnovers for the Florida giant.

Maryland went 2 of 4 man-up.  The Irish had no opportunities on power play.

 

(Credit: Dan Aburn/Inside Lacrosse)

Our Pregame Questions

Going into the game, we had 3 areas of focus:

  1. Create faceoff parity: The goal was to improve over 2022 and create some recovery, and they succeeded.  It wasn’t a huge improvement, but the improvement often came at critical times.  This is a good sign for the Irish, as the trend line is very much pointing up.
  2. Defensive pressure: This was most on display in the overtime sessions. Even that late in the game, the defense had the conditioning to pound and frustrate the Terrapins.
  3. Multiple offense:  Yes, yes and yes. It was clear the Terp plan was to frustrate the Kavanaghs with Makar and Zapatello, and to keep the physical Trader on Dobson long enough for support to arrive. They did a good job implementing their plan.  But this left McCahon, Tevlin, Simmons, Gray, etc. free to run wild, and Ricciardelli will feel cheated that his great shots didn’t land. This left CKav and PKav to be heroes only when heroes were needed.

Thoughts

The significance of this win can’t be understated.  Maryland hasn’t lost at SECU since before the Covid-19 pandemic! Notre Dame needed to show they can grind out a win, and in this case, grind out a Statement Win, as our friend Drew Brennan at OFD would say.  The boys responded to the challenge.

On the defensive end, the slide/recovery cycles were polished. They can’t be displeased with the progress 1/3 into the season.  They were also not allowing much to happen in the interior. It’s fun to watch.

The defense is also consistently disruptive.  They are regularly reaching double-digit caused turnovers, and these successful efforts are not concentrated in one or two players.  They are fairly evenly spread across the roster, with sixteen Irish players recording at least one CT.

Maryland had a pretty good defensive strategy going into the game. They tried to neutralize the Kavanaghs, knowing that this would probably limit Ricciardelli in the process.  Additionally, it appear they were going to force Dobson to his right and only support their defender when Dobson tried to bull to his left.  This gave Dobson a bunch of good right-handed looks, but the Terps seemed content to weather those as opposed to risking letting him shoot left-handed. His 1-for-9 shooting seemed to validate the strategy. However, Notre Dame simply had too many weapons and Maryland could not account for them all.

The clear game remains a work in progress. The boys appeared more comfortable, but they had a lot of trouble communicating at midfield, which led to a few very unnecessary and very untimely turnovers.

In post-game comments Coach Corrigan indicated Taylor was clear to play on the man-up unit, but there were no enforced penalties on Maryland. Coach’s clever hunch got him inserted into the final play.  We were certainly duped viewing live.  It was only on the immediate replay of the goal that we saw the #13!!  We are hopeful this is a signed he would be returning fulltime soon.

Lynch’s raw numbers may not leap off the page, but he came up with his wins at critical moments to blunt any Maryland momentum.  Even with a fairly large possession advantage, Maryland was never allowed to run away with it. He hit the brakes in a lot of situations that could very easily have been game dominating scoring runs.

24 Fighting Irish saw the field, with Donovan being the only freshman.  The coaches definitely shortened the bench and obligated McCahon and Tevlin to a lot of minutes on both sides of the field.

Up Next

#9 Ohio State visits Arlotta Stadium on March 11 at 2:00 (ACCN).

 

#GoIrish