#8 Notre Dame Fighting Irish lacrosse (2-0) faces its last two out-of-conference opponents before ACC play. This afternoon the Irish face Marquette (0-4) at 4:00 pm, ACC Network, and Cleveland State (1-2) this Saturday at 1:00, ACCNX.
The Irish needs these two opportunities to improve and catch up to the game experience of their ACC foes.
The Opponent: Marquette
Wednesday is for the hunter. As observed last week, afternoon games at Arlotta can be strange events, and weekday games give underdogs more chance. The Golden Eagles have come dangerously close to upsetting the Irish with alarming frequency.
This year’s Marquette is a stronger team than their record suggests. They opened the season with close losses to Denver and Villanova, and has had little trouble scoring against good defenses, including putting up 13 against the vaunted Georgetown defense.
Griffin Fleming and Devon Cowan are their main scoring threats having scored 10 goals each this season. Freshman Mason Woodward has been a revelation on defense with 25 ground balls and 9 caused turnovers. They’ve explored a lot of goalkeeping options, but Sean Richard appears to be their best option saving well over 50% so far.
The Golden Eagles have struggled at the faceoff dot, winning only .313, and have been challenged clearing the ball (.814). They have also struggled staying off of man-down, where they give up goals in more than 40% of opponent opportunities. These should play to Notre Dame’s strengths.
The Opponent: Cleveland State
Like the Irish, the Vikings haven’t played many games yet this season. Cleveland State has gotten off to a rough start. However, they recently played the previous Notre Dame opponent, Bellarmine, and stomped them 8-1.
The Cleveland State offense hasn’t found its legs yet, averaging under 9 goals per game. Brendan Sigurdson has been their best scoring option so far, with their 2020 scoring leaders still on the sideline, but Dylan Warner and Chase Baker found their range against Bellarmine. Evan Moskwa is a good faceoff specialist, winning over 50% of his draws.
Goalie Kevin Sobey has had a very strong start to the season and has the potential of really frustrating the Irish shooters.
It’s really difficult to be sure on what to expect from this team. Like Notre Dame, they haven’t played a lot, and they are only now getting all their players worked into the lineup.
Our Pregame Questions
Both games will have similar objectives for the Irish. Certainly, the goal is to win and to win convincingly, but to get there, we’ll see if Notre Dame will perform as follows:
- Focus: Once again, the Irish will be called upon to focus and play the full 60 minutes. Their schedule is such that they can’t waste these opportunities to get better. Ground balls, turnovers, and disciplined clears.
- Man-down defense: Generally speaking, the Notre Dame defense has been great. If there is a concern, it’s that the man-down unit isn’t as sharp as is should be. Sample size is low, so there’s no reason for concern, but we’d love to see the open question put to rest.
- Offensive chemistry: The Irish have played a lot more offensive player combinations than we’ve seen in many years. This is great, of course, but it takes time to fully develop chemistry, and it’s hard to fine tune so many combinations in so few games. The Irish have a lot to do this week.
What do we expect?
On paper, Notre Dame is expected to be comfortable in both games with its talented and very deep roster. However, Marquette in particular has always been a difficult opponent, and the Irish simply don’t have the game experience built up to think they can coast without a lot of effort and focus. If things go well, we’ll see nearly 40 players see the field in each game. If either opponent finds a opening in the Irish defense or frustrates the offense, we may see less than 30, and that would be a problem for the team long-term.
The weather for Marquette is forecast for 60 degree temps and cloudy skies.
#GoIrish
