Time to exhale. Maryland and Michigan have christened Big Ten Lacrosse. BTN was on hand as was the largest crowd of the season. Maryland’s play was a bit sloppy but in the end, the Terps had the better collection of athletes and more skilled lacrosse players. The Terps claimed their seventh consecutive win with a 13-4 thrashing of the Michigan Wolverines in Byrd Stadium Saturday. Here’s a close look at the game.
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Perhaps it was the pomp and circumstance of being part of the first ever Big Ten lacrosse conference game and a BTN broadcast.
Perhaps Maryland was a bit weary and unfocused from their west coast trip and quick turn around game three days later at Robert Morris. The Terps came in riding on the winds of a six game winning streak with four of those coming against ranked teams.
Perhaps the Terps simply thought it would be easy.
Whatever the cause, the first half wasn’t exactly the sort of “it’s the men against the boys” sort of game you might expect when the 4-4 Michigan Wolverines came to College Park to face the third ranked Maryland Terrapins in the Big Ten opener for both squads. It was, as Maryland coach John Tillman said, “Not a clean game by any standards.”
The Wolverines had lost three of four including a 9-7 loss to Drexel – a team the Terps had beaten 12-3 earlier in the season. They played two games against ranked squads losing 17-8 to number two Notre Dame 22-12 to number 20 Brown.
Yes, Maryland led 4-1 at the break behind two goals from leading scorer Matt Rambo and singletons by Isaiah Davis-Allen (the first of his career) and Connor Kelly.
Yes Maryland held a 5-2 edge in faceoffs and had an 18-10 margin in ground balls. But, the Terrapins also had nine turnovers and many of those were simply careless passes or ill-advised attempts to force the ball into the heart of Michigan’s defense.
The Terps were firing shots with abandon at Michigan goalie Gerald Logan but not, as Coach John Tillman preaches, always taking the best shot. The evidence for this, Maryland launched 21 shots, scored on only four and Logan had eight saves.
“The game was similar to last year,” Tillman said. “Defensively they slid a lot to us. They made us move the ball quickly and at times (today) we didn’t handle it real well. Maybe the guys were really excited to be back in Byrd for the first time in a while. Sometimes when you’re that excited offensively, you don’t stay as poised as you’d like.”
Second Half is a different story
The second half was a bit of a different story. During one stretch in the third period, the men’s team looked as though they wanted to challenge the women’s squad as the most potent offense in Maryland lacrosse.
The outburst went like this: Jay Carlson scored with 8:19 to play in the period. Charlie Raffa won the faceoff, got the ball ahead to Tim Muller who fed Joe LoCasio for the sixth goal of the game. The entire sequence required 18 seconds. Eleven seconds later, Davis-Allen picked up the ground ball off Raffa’s faceoff effort and netted his second of the day. Rambo netted his hat trick with 6:52 to play. In the space of 1:27 off the game clock, Maryland’s lead had ballooned from 4-1 to 8-1.
Colin Heacock added another goal before Michigan scored what would be the last goal of the period with 3:10 to play. At the end of three, Maryland led 9-2.
The fourth quarter started with a bang when Matt Neufeldt, the reigning B1G Defensive Player of the Week scored the first goal of his career just 17 seconds in. The scoring from the defense surprised Michigan head coach John Paul, “They haven’t really shown that this year. We were riding them pretty hard at times but we didn’t anticipate that their players would run up. They hadn’t shown that all year and today they did that.”
The teams traded goals and the Terrapins led 11-4 when Zack Wholley and Ian Robertson added two goal late for the final 13-4 margin.
Maryland’s shot selection was much better in the second half though they still didn’t protect their possessions very well. On debit side of the ledger, the Terps scored on nine of their 20 shots and Logan made only four saves. On the credit side, they added seven turnovers to total 16 for the game.
Another reason for the Terps’ dominance was Charlie Raffa. After struggling early in the season, the senior has regained his authority on face offs. After winning 15 of 22 against two games ago, Raffa was 11-14 in that specialty stat against Michigan on Saturday. Maryland also has a very capable backup in John Garino who won four of six.
The future of Big Ten Lacrosse
Maryland is likely to be the dominant face of the conference for the near future. But the Big Ten is filled with schools with deep pockets and extensive resources. Maryland fans who miss the intensity of ACC lacrosse need only wait a few years. The conference showed it’s commitment by bringing in Johns Hopkins as an affiliate member.
With coaches like Paul who is happy to have Maryland lacrosse as a part of the B1G, that future is not too distant. “For us at Michigan where the Big Ten is so much a part of our fabric and so much a part of what we are and who we are. This is special for us. It’s special for us from a lacrosse perspective but also for our program.
“Being part of the Big Ten is really special for us. Everybody else around us is and now we are, too. We feel like we finally got to join the party that all the others programs at Michigan have been part of forever.”
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