#6 Notre Dame Fighting Irish men’s lacrosse (4-0) defeated the Cleveland State Vikings (1-3), 19-5. The Irish were dominant throughout the contest, and concluded their out of conference schedule with a perfect record.
No March Madness for us, we’re focused on lacrosse! The team appears to have met all its preparation goals leading into ACC play.
The Scoring
15 players contributing points is an awful lot! Pat Kavanagh continued his early-season tear with 4 goals and an assist. Griffin Westlin was his equal with 2 goals and 3 assists. Mikey Drake had a goal and an assist, with Dobson, McCahon and Walker each with a goal and an assist. Mirer, Morin, Cassidy, Lipka, Yorke, Leonard and Harris each had a goal. Hallenbeck added 2 more assists to his impressive season point total.
Quentin Buchman had his first two goals for the Irish!
Gallagher, Leonard and Almeida combined for an amazing 22 of 28 at faceoff x. Entenmann had 9 saves with Schmidt adding another 2 in relief.
Boyer had 3 ground balls and a caused turnover, and Kielty added 2 more caused turnovers.
As a team, they had a disciplined 10 turnovers (5 in the 4th quarter), cleared 100% of their opportunities, scored on their only man-up opportunity, and killed 4 of 5 man-down situations.
Our friends at lacrossereference.com observed the Irish dominated possessions, 47-29, while scoring at over 40% efficiency, and while holding the Vikings to 17%. Notre Dame was also quick with the ball, averaging 39 seconds per possession, including 29 seconds to the first shot and averaging 1.2 shots per possession.
Freshmen who saw the field included Dobson, Burgmaster, Parlette, Walker, Conroy and Michael Lynch.
Viking goalie Kevin Sobey played well with 13 saves.
The Plot
The game started with a rare Gallagher faceoff loss, but after exchanging a few possessions, the Irish defensive midfield got the action going with transition goals, the first by Cassidy, and the second by Kavanagh assisted by Hallenbeck,
The Irish quickly took control of the game and began to substitute liberally, especially on defense. Aside from a stretch in the second where Notre Dame had to kill a few extended penalties, the field was tilted heavily towards the Irish.
Midway through the 3rd quarter, Notre Dame experimented with a variety of personnel options and continued the process of getting more players on the field until the final minutes. This led to 2 goals from Buchman, along with goals from players like Moring and Walker. At no point did the Irish let the Vikings generate any sort of interest.
Our Pregame Questions
As noted in our Marquette recap. we viewed these last two games as one process. For an overall feel, our belief was that if the Irish played 40 players, we would be more than satisfied. Notre Dame played exactly 40 and the game felt as good as we thought a 40-player game would feel.
- Focus: The Irish gave a solid and focused 60 minutes against the Vikings. They had only 11 turnovers, with 5 coming in the 4th when the Irish were playing almost entirely players that don’t have as much experience. We’ll note in the first half, the defense stayed disciplined even with the back line substituting often, and much earlier and consistently than the offense, with little negative impact to the overall defense. Schalit, Burgmaster and Napolitano saw a lot of the field very early, with players like Cheng, Ford and Littlefield contributing effectively later in the game.
- Man-Down Defense: The Irish had to deal with a few penalties in a short period of time in the late 1st and early 2nd quarters. The Irish comfortably killed 4 of 5 (8 of 10 over the last two games). Notre Dame made a lot of progress in this area and looked the part. For sure, we’d love to have seen fewer penalties, but the team certainly checked the box that the man-down unit is in good form leading into ACC play.
- Offensive Chemistry: Kavanagh and Westlin really have things going on, and the depth of scoring down the lineup is really special. Over the years we’ve grown used to having an alpha scorer, but we forgot how great it is to have threats up and down the lineup. Of particular note is the transition threat from the SSDMs. They are really sharp in transition as a unit. Buchman’s quick release looks like it will come in handy on the man-up, and the Irish did a lot of work letting the faceoff unit push the pace and take chances to great effect.
Notre Dame checked all the boxes we hoped they would and added a few new wrinkles. They accomplished as much as we could hope for at this point in the season. There wasn’t much more for the team to do prior to embarking on league play. Defense is sharp, transition is dialed in, and the Irish explored a lot of different offensive configurations. Cleveland State also did Notre Dame a favor by not playing a zone, giving the boys a chance to prepare against a style more typical to the top ACC defenses.
Where do the Irish go from here?
Up next is Virginia this Saturday. The Irish will be going against a team willing to take risks and push the pace. But the boys are as well situated to counter-attack, moreso than they have in many years. It will also be a test for the faceoff unit going against the very solid Petey LaSalla.
But again, the team did what they needed to do to maximize their preparations to this point. In the past, the team may have let their opponents sneak into a few games. Not this year. It has been all business so far.
#GoIrish
