#4 Notre Dame lacrosse lost to #10 Duke this afternoon 8-11 in Durham, NC.
A rough start, an inability to put away easy shots, and perhaps a questionable defensive strategy, was more than the Irish could overcome against Duke. Perkovic had two goals (including his career 100th), Garnsey and Wynne with two each, and Gleason and Sexton added goals. The highlights:
The game started well enough with a Mikey Wynne BTB off a Perkovic pass. Then it went off the rails for a while. However, if one was to just look at the stat sheet, it would not appear this game was a stinker. Notre Dame, for the first time in a long while, outright won the faceoff battle and had no penalties to Duke’s four, and also had the upper hand in clears and turnovers. Every other stat was basically even. So where did it go wrong?
- Shane Doss had a very rough start. He seemed flat footed and gave up three uncharacteristically weak goals. This put the Irish on the back foot almost immediately. Coach Corrigan pulled Doss for Molloy, who was serviceable enough given that he came in cold. Late in the game Doss was put back in and played better, but the damage was done. The Irish are fortunate that it is so rare for Doss to be off his game.
- The defensive strategy to start seemed odd. Notre Dame was determined not to give Duke the inside, the area where their leading scorer Guterding does his best work. However, they left their short stick middies on an island up top and didn’t offer much slide help. We get the idea of clogging the middle (Guterding was effectively shut down) but any ACC starting midfielder will abuse that matchup and they did. It did not help that the short stick middies tripped and fell on three occasions directly leading to goals. The Irish adjusted, as they always do, but by this point they were in a deep hole.
- The Irish missed easy scoring opportunities. The first culprit was Garnsey, who both wiffed after a brilliant feed from Sexton, and who went for a highlight reel shot on a pass from Perkovic that went wide instead of just scoring. The second was Byrne, who continues to have difficulty putting the ball away after beating his man. Byrne has been excellent at creating scoring opportunities but has a below .200 shooting percentage. He will want his two shots back today. Finally, Wynne missed some point-blank opportunities today. He’s the best closer in the game, when he gets the ball at that range it’s supposed to go in. In all, Notre Dame’s .250 shooting percentage is inconsistent with the ease of some of the opportunities.
- Man-up offense was flat terrible. 0-for-4 and looked bad doing it. We put a timer to it, and the time Duke possessed the ball during the ND EMOs was about the same as the Irish. This is not good.
There’s more to add, but these were the points that stuck out the most. There were several positive aspects that are worth noting. The faceoff wings were spectacular ND and the Irish committed no penalties! The poles definitely put in a good days work. Garnsey, while he flubbed some easy ones, scores hard goals like no other (and his goal with 3.5 mins left should have counted!!). Finally, Sexton was simply spectacular today. A few of his highlights courtesy of Patrick McEwen @LaxFilmRoom:
Who needs to wait for the O mids sub on? Schantz to Sexton for the long pole rip. pic.twitter.com/fhTOCkGtYt
— Lacrosse Film Room (@LaxFilmRoom) April 8, 2017
Add this play the John Sexton highlight tape pic.twitter.com/4wyuN3HdXN
— Lacrosse Film Room (@LaxFilmRoom) April 8, 2017
Good job by the Duke D of shutting off everyone off ball when they got the pole on pole matchup & another nice save by Fowler pic.twitter.com/KcgjMEaBPq
— Lacrosse Film Room (@LaxFilmRoom) April 8, 2017
Where does this leave the Irish?
- The short-schedule strategy is leaving the Irish no room to maneuver. The upcoming Marquette and North Carolina games have suddenly become must-win games. The Irish will also watch Sunday’s UVa vs. NC game with great interest to determine their options to qualify for the ACC tournament.
- Notre Dame will likely drop to the bottom of the top-10, but their RPI should remain strong.
- The Irish should not feel outclassed by Duke, Syracuse or Denver, their three losses. There is nothing about these games that suggest the Irish are not in the same category. With this said, they need to find ways to actually win these games instead of giving them away.
- Up next, a midweek game against Marquette. A classic Admiral Akbar trap game. The boys need not only to win, but to win with authority.
What are your thoughts? We will enjoy reading your comments.
To an admittedly untrained eye, I thought Duke looked like the clearly better team. While there were a couple quasi-flukes in that 1) their goalie was completely on fire in a way that seems unsustainable and (2) we missed a couple wide open opportunities (Garnsey trying to shoot as hard as possible with no defender on him 5 feet from the goal seems, uh, bold), most of the game it looked like their defense kept us from running our offense the way we wanted to. As you noted, this was particularly frustrating on man-up situations. Also frustrating because eff Duke.
Hopefully I’m wrong and we beat them in a rematch in the ACC tournament.
I don’t think there was much about Duke that would make me think they were the better team. They had a better day, for sure, but I like the Irish’s chances against Duke more than Syracuse. Syracuse , this year, plays that slow style that is ND’s Achilles heel.