2011 Men's Lacrosse Discussion

[nychoya3]

Tough loss. Made a great play to tie it at the end of regulation, and lost the faceoff and Cuse worked their way into a good chance and a goal. The defense, which had been smoked by Harvard and UMd so far, played very well to hold Cuse to 9. Would have been an excellent win, but unfortunately we don't really have the luxury of moral victories after one bad loss already and only so many chances left to make a positive impression on the NCAA committee (that has shown the past two years they will NOT give GU a break.)

[hoya4ever]

www.guhoyas.com/sports/m-lacros/recaps/031911aaa.html we at least beat Providence. We should have scored more but at least the defense stepped it up.

We do have a few games around the 14-15 goal range now, so that gives me a tiny, tiny, tiny glimmer of hope all is not lost.

[RusskyHoya]

Lose at Duke, 14-12. Duke went on a 10-2 run to take the lead. Hoyas had led 6-1 and 8-3. SMH

[reformation]

Is there any scenario other than winning the BET to make the NCAA tournament--

[nychoya3]

The automatic bid goes to the regular season champion of the BE, I believe. I don't think there's a tourney until next year. They probably need to win the league at this point which would require two losses by Cuse and beating ND. If they win out the rest of the way, they have a case, but the last few years have shown the lacrosse committee has no problem snubbing the Hoyas in years when they're clearly deserving.

Another tough loss -- this team has been snakebit the last few years.

[augustusfinknottle]

Snakebit? They're not earning it.

[hoya4ever]

Win against Navy. Led the whole game, indeed we let two large leads sleep away. Both teams unranked.

[DFW HOYA]

Georgetown gives up a late goal at Notre Dame, 7-6. Hoyas drop to 5-5, 2-2 in Big East (4th place)

Four games remaining, three at home, but games like this reconfirm what the lacrosse message boards have been saying for a while, namely, the committee will pass on Georgetown for a fourth straight year.

[whatmaroon]

Lost 7-6 to undefeated #2 ND today on ESPNU. I caught from mid-second on, first game I've seen this year. I still don't understand the rules of this damn game, but ND is the best defensive team in the country and their great positional discipline was evident. It was close throughout, no runs either way, but ND got a man advantage with less than 3 minutes to play and cashed in.

[hoya4ever]

The remaining four games are non factors. Our last chance slipped away with that goal.

[LizziebethHoya]

Sad truth of the matter is...we are no longer an elite Men's Lax program.

[FrazierFanatic]

What bothers me, admittedly as a fan who mostly sees only TV games, with an occasional away game every 2 or 3 years, is an apparent lack of intensity and energy from the staff that seems to exist in the top programs. I don't know enough to really evaluate this issue, but Coach does not seem to be able to fire the team up when needed.

[sleepyjackson21]

Unfortunately we have lost so many close games whether it's been in the waning seconds of regulation or in overtime. It seems to happen with startling regularity.

[hoya4ever]

Apr 18, 2011 15:19:44 GMT -5 FrazierFanatic said:

What bothers me, admittedly as a fan who mostly sees only TV games, with an occasional away game every 2 or 3 years, is an apparent lack of intensity and energy from the staff that seems to exist in the top programs. I don't know enough to really evaluate this issue, but Coach does not seem to be able to fire the team up when needed.

This lack of energy has been going on for forever. I have seen other teams practice with more intensity than we play.

[JohnJacquesLayup]

I know Urick built our lacrosse program, and I grew up watching him and the Hoyas ascend into one of the premier programs, but we're clearly on a steady decline in performance and recruiting. Sure our winning records look good, but I don't think anyone is satisfied with 9-5 and missing the postseason. Urick's been here 22 years, what can he do to revitalize his struggling program? Or have the past few season just been an anomaly/rebuilding?

Unless the feeling is that, with the growing number of competitive lacrosse programs, a steady Top-10 presence and consistently making post season play is a thing of the past.

[HometownHoya]

Honestly I feel like this is just a result of the growth of lacrosse as a sport. There are better players in the non-hotbed lacrosse leagues and areas. DC used to just be the IAC (well rly just Landon and Prep). Baltimore the MIAA. But the public schools are doing better nowadays. Lacrosse is actually a sport in California now. Moving from California to DC in 2001, I didn't even know what lacrosse was. It is growing all across the country and thus there are better players from unlikely areas.

Not sure how our recruiting has gone the past 2-3 years but it seemed like we were getting some of the top players from the "top" leagues in HS lacrosse. Maybe Urick just doesnt have the comfort recruiting on a national stage rather then just going NE. Who knows but I hope we can solve the problem because I believe a strong lacrosse program is important.

Last point, there are Universities that are competitive now that top programs didn't even care about. ND hasn't been this good long. Colorado has a decent team now.

Maybe its about time to expand the NCAA Tourney for Lax?

[hoya4ever]

That's a good point, HH, but I would like to add something to it. Even when we did make the tourney, we never really got really far. Our defense did well, but our offense always left something to be desired. The point isn't getting into the tourney. It's about winning it.

Next year is going to be ten years since our one and only FF run. Since then, we have only made it into the elite eight or not made it at all (last four years).

[theexorcist]

Apr 20, 2011 10:50:22 GMT -5 HometownHoya said:

Honestly I feel like this is just a result of the growth of lacrosse as a sport. There are better players in the non-hotbed lacrosse leagues and areas. DC used to just be the IAC (well rly just Landon and Prep). Baltimore the MIAA. But the public schools are doing better nowadays. Lacrosse is actually a sport in California now. Moving from California to DC in 2001, I didn't even know what lacrosse was. It is growing all across the country and thus there are better players from unlikely areas.

Not sure how our recruiting has gone the past 2-3 years but it seemed like we were getting some of the top players from the "top" leagues in HS lacrosse. Maybe Urick just doesnt have the comfort recruiting on a national stage rather then just going NE. Who knows but I hope we can solve the problem because I believe a strong lacrosse program is important.

Last point, there are Universities that are competitive now that top programs didn't even care about. ND hasn't been this good long. Colorado has a decent team now.

Maybe its about time to expand the NCAA Tourney for Lax?

Colorado doesn't have a team. Denver does - they hired Bill Tierney, who made Princeton a juggernaut.

With the above expansion, the same teams are still there - UVA, Hopkins, Syracuse, Maryland, and a few others. It's not too much to expect GU at that level since they were there beforehand.

[nychoya3]

Thing is, they are consistently CLOSE. Other than getting housed by Maryland in the second game of the season, they have been within a good bounce of winning every other game on their schedule this year. Heck, in the latest loss to Loyola, they had something like 15 shots in OT before losing. Honestly, it's hard NOT to score on that many shots. It just seems like they're always on the wrong side of these games.

I think recruiting rankings in lacrosse are extremely suspect, but we continue to get pretty good players from what I can tell. But always a little bit short of the top schools. Weird and frustrating. Just given location and educational cache we should be among the top tier schools, if a little below the JHU/UVA/Cuse tier.

[Admin]

Bad loss at home to Yale, 13-8.