Notre Dame Fighting Irish lacrosse concocted an amazing late comeback and defeated the Virginia Cavaliers in overtime, 13-12. Co-Captain Brian Tevlin’s wild goal 29 seconds into overtime won it for the Irish. 32,107 were there to see the Irish advance to the championship game.

The national championship game is up next against Duke Blue Devils, Monday at 1:00 pm, ESPN. Duke survived their game against Penn State on an extremely controversial goal in overtime.

All The Emotions

The day began with chills as the sounds of bagpipes echoed from deep inside the Lincoln Financial Field tunnel. Burgmaster and Tevlin soon emerged leading the Irish onto the field.

Excitement soon followed as Levels blasted for the opening faceoff.  We couldn’t help but wonder if the stadium DJ was in on the Twitter lacrosse bit, but we were sure it meant good things for the Irish.

Hagstrom won the opening faceoff for the Irish and the energy began to build. Relief soon followed as Dobson dodged to his right and opening the scoring on an overhand blast. Activating the big midfielder was critical to Notre Dame’s chances. A Dobson snipe had opened the scoring in over half of Notre Dame’s wins this year.

Soon after, Simmons scored another giving the Irish the momentum.

Reality began to set it and Virginia scored the next 3 taking the lead and showing they weren’t just going to roll over.

The Irish stayed focused and another goal from Simmons followed by a  AMAZING behind the back pass from PKav that lead to a goal from Taylor with 0:02 seconds left in the quarter gave the Irish the lead after 1.

Concern began to build in the second quarter. It was a dogfight, beginning with 2 goals from Virginia to give them the lead.

It was brought back to even by Ramsey after just 2 minutes of Virginia leading. With 4 minutes to go, Virginia scored again, giving them the lead. Dobson scored his second of the day to bring it to a 6-6 tie game at the half.

The Irish regained the lead less than 2 minutes into the second half on another Dobson goal. But the excitement subsided quickly and the Cavaliers regained the lead a few minutes later.

From there the Irish had to give their all to keep the game in range 8-9, 8-10, 9-10, 9-11, and 10-11.

With two minutes left, Dobson answered the call again and marched in to tie the game 11-11.

The next minute was an extremely anxious one for the Irish. Shellenberger passed from X to a streaking McConvey to give Virginia the lead with 52 seconds left. Deflation was the emotion.

But Lynch came to the rescue and won the next faceoff, advancing the ball into the offensive end to allow Coach Corrigan to call a time out to draw up a play.  Tevlin dodged to his right and found Jake Taylor back in the center of the field. A wild backhanded twister shot to the top corner, game tied with :32 seconds left.  The Irish got their miracle

Overtime.

Will Lynch was clutch and won the opening faceoff, allowing another ND timeout.  We can’t stress enough how much Lynch and Hagstrom elevated their games against Virginia’s LaSalla.

Out of the timeout, Tevlin carried the ball to his left looking for Dobson. But it was clear Virginia was ready to block him out. However, this created a seam in the defense that Tevlin was quick to exploit. He crashed through the Cavalier defense for a backhand leaner.  Elation, and ballgame.

The Scoring

Eric Dobson led Irish scorers with 4 goals and an assist. Pat Kavanagh (setting the Notre Dame season scoring record) and Jack Simmons had 2 goals and an assist each. PKav also added 4 ground balls (don’t forget CityLax!). Jake Taylor had 2 wild goals. Tevlin had the game winner and an assist, and CKav and Ramsey had a goal each.

The faceoff unit was incredible, winning 16 of 28, including the last two, led by Will Lynch’s 13 of 22.

Ensign Markland Kelly Goalie of the Year recipient Liam Entenmann had 11 saves against a point-blank shooting Virginia squad.

On the defensive end, Marco Napalitano excelled with a ground ball and 2 caused turnovers. Chris Conlin added 3 ground balls.

As a team, the Irish were careful with the ball with only 10 turnovers. They also overwhelmed the Cavaliers in ground balls, 32-30, a sign of supreme effort.

Our friends at Lacrossereference.com calculated efficiencies to be nearly even 29.5% for ND, and 30.8% for UVa. Time of possession was dead even.

Recovery

We won’t spend a lot of time worrying about the X’s and O’s for Monday.  Notre Dame has won their last three against the Blue Devils and knows what to do schematically. Their motivation must come from the desire to beat the team that ended Notre Dame’s season each of the 6 times they have met in the NCAA tournament, including twice in the finals.

The team has less than 48 hours to rehydrate and recover, particularly for PKav, CKav, and Lynch, who took an absolute beating. PKav may need a Star Wars bacta tank to be ready. The 2-way ironmen Tevlin and McCahon will need extra preparation as well to be available for 60 minutes.

It’s well established that the second semifinal winner has a significant recovery disadvantage and Notre Dame hasn’t played with such a short turnaround. But we have supreme faith in Mandy Merritt and the rest of the training and recovery team.  Mandy is the best in the business. She will have the boys ready.

We all know the drill.  Fake needs to limit O’Neil, Lynch/Hagstrom need to take it to Naso, and the attack needs to spin the ball quickly. Our boys will be ready.

Max Manyak

We all saw the on-field heroics of co-captains Entenmann, Kavanagh and Tevlin.  What most did not see were the efforts of the fourth, senior Max Manyak, the wearing of the #40 honor, and the hype man who leads the boys on the field behind our bagpipers.  The the postgame celebration, Max thanked all the coaches and staff, and took the time after the field cleared to bring in the reserve sticks and equipment so his teammates could celebrate. His leadership is by service, and we can all learn from Max.

Please also read our colleague Drew Brennan, who was also at the game.

One more to go.

#GoIrish