#4 Notre Dame Fighting Irish men’s lacrosse (7-3, 3-3 ACC) concluded their regular season by demolishing the #10 Syracuse Orangemen (6-5, 2-4 ACC) in every way imaginable, 22-8.

The Irish await their seeding for the NCAA Championships, which will be announced this coming Sunday.

The Scoring

The scoring was plentiful, but we’ll begin with a recognition of a performance that isn’t reflected on the stat sheet.  Kielty, Cohen, Thornton, Hallenbeck, Cassidy, Harris, McNamara, Boyer and Burgmaster were absolutely dominant on defense.  Arden Cohen earned the ACC Defensive Player of the Week honors.

The score sheet is highlighted by the Notre Dame record-setting 10 point day by Pat Kavanagh: 5 goals, 5 assists, 5 ground balls, and 2 caused turnovers,

Quinn McCahon and Griffin Westlin had stellar days with 3 goals and 2 assists, each. Wheaton Jackoboice had 2 goals and 2 assists, Eric Dobson 2 goals and an assist, and Will Yorke 2 goals. Lipka, Morin, Leonard, McNamara and Reilly Gray added a goal each, and Mo Mirer rounded out the scoring with an assist.

Entenmann looked great with 11 saves, as did Matt Schmidt with 3 saves in relief.

Gallagher, Leonard and Almeida combined to go 20 of 32 at the dot.

The Irish went 4 of 7 man-up, and cleared 17 of 20 opportunities.

Our friends at lacrossereference.com observed that the Irish had 48 possessions to Syracuse’s 34, won time of possession at 61.8%, and had an efficiency of 45.8%.

38 players saw the field for the Irish.

The Pat Kavanagh Goal of the Week

Pat Kavanagh’s record 5 goal, 5 assist game earned him the US Lacrosse Player of the Week honor. Just about every week this season we’ve posted a highlight of a ridiculous PKav goal.  This week, the scoring got so silly it was hard to choose, so we present three Pat Kavanagh Goals of the Week:

The Dive

The Interception

We Don’t Know What This Is

The Plot

For such a lopsided final score, the game certainly started with some doubts.  Syracuse won the opening possession which ended with a great low off-side save by Entenmann.  Notre Dame was not able to do much its first few possessions, and they were not comfortably clearing the ball.

Syracuse went up 0-2 on goals by Hiltz and Dordevic before the Irish responded with goals from Westlin, Yorke, and a crazy dive by Kavanagh. Syracuse answered to finish the quarter 3-3.

Peter Dearth scored the first goal of the 2nd for Syracuse, but Leonard won the next faceoff and scored 8 seconds later.

Then the rout began.  The Irish scored 9 of the next 10 goals.  Points were coming in all sorts of ways, and Syracuse was forced into a packed zone to simply bring the scoring rate down to something less embarrassing.  An Orange goal as the half expired brought the score to 13-6, with the Irish having scored 10 goals in 15 possessions.

The Irish continued the onslaught into the 3rd, with Syracuse powerless to do anything against the stifling Notre Dame defense.  Six more goals brought it to 19-6 at the end of the quarter.

Notre Dame began to explore personnel options in the 4th while extending the lead to 21-6, and Matt Schmidt took over in cage to finish off the win. Syracuse kept in their starters and tried to claw back some dignity with two late goals as the 4th quarter came to an end.

The game had a poetic ending with senior #22 Connor Morin scoring Notre Dame’s 22nd and final goal of the game.

Final Score, Notre Dame 22, Syracuse 8.

Jimmy Littlefield #40

We were please to see #40 worn by the Irish late in the game.  Like Brendan Gleason and Sergio Perkovic before him, Littlefield was chosen by his teammates to wear the number in honor of former Irish captain Mike “Steel” Sennett.

Our Notes

Reviewing our pregame notes:

  1. Fast start: The Irish did start slowly.  Not as slowly as in the first meeting, but any worries were quickly put to bed with a 10 goal 2nd quarter..
  2. Faceoff: Irish had a comfortable advantage and made more of their wins, including a Leonard goal, before mentioning disruption like the Kav interception of a Syracuse faceoff win for a quick goal.
  3. Clears: Admittedly, clearing was a bit sketchy at the beginning of the game.  Once nerves settled and scoring flowed, it ceased being a problem.
  4. End possessions:  The stats showed Syracuse with 1.2 shots per possession, which was surprising because it didn’t feel like it.  Overall time of possession was so heavily skewed to the Irish that we feel comfortable saying they checked this box.
  5. Attack: Kavanagh and company were relentless coming at the Syracuse poles and their defense in general.  Well done!

Overall, it’s hard to think of a better way to end the regular season!

Up Next:  The NCAAs!!

The Irish await their seeding for the NCAA tournament, to be announced Sunday evening on ESPNU.

#GoIrish