Game Essentials – Spring Break edition Gettysburg 9, Cabrini 8 (OT) – Wednesday, March 19 – Gettysburg needed overtime before Tom O’Donnell could finally put away the upstart Cabrini Cavaliers. Both teams were undefeated and are at the top of the South heading into the game. In heavy, consistent rain, the Bullets scored four last minute goals, one at the end of each quarter, to survive. Salisbury 6, Denison 3 – Sunday, March 16 – Salisbury trailed 3-2 early in the second half before finally tying it to head into the fourth quarter. Then Kevin Kustron and Greg Titus (twice) managed to seal the win for Salisbury in this defensive struggle. “It helps when your goalie plays to his potential and frustrated their shooters all game long,” said Denison head coach Matt McGinnis. “We just played great man to man…we worked hard to eliminate their ability to be dangerous in transition. Also, we felt that since their offense is predicated on defenses sliding to help, we did not want to put ourselves in too many vulnerable positions.” Nazareth 8, Wesleyan 5 – Tuesday, March 18 – Nazareth used four-goal first and third quarters to win this evenly matched contest. Corey Remoli (3g, 2a) and Aaron Civalier (2g, 2a) provided the offense, while Todd Dermody made a difference with his 13 saves. With the loss, Wesleyan drops to 1-2, and Nazareth moves to 3-1. Roanoke 20, Tufts 8 – Tuesday, March 18 – The Roanoke Maroons may have hit their offensive stride. They started with a 14-8 win on Saturday over Dickinson before exploding for twenty against Tufts. Roanoke dominated the stat sheet with a 50-23 shot advantage, overwhelming 68-32 groundball advantage, near perfect clearing percentage (21-of-22), and winning 23-of-31 faceoffs. Sophomore attackman Ashton Hotchkiss was the catalyst with four goals and three assists for Roanoke. Wheaton 11, Endicott 9- Tuesday, March 18 – Endicott was riding high heading into this match-up at 5-0, only to have Wheaton pull off the upset with two goals in the final 1:11 for the two-goal win for head coach Mike McCaffrey’s first win. Despite a 41-20 shot advantage and 17-of-24 edge facing off, Endicott was handed their first loss of the season. Bowdoin 17, St. Lawrence 10 – Monday, March 17 – On St. Patrick’s Day in Sylvan Lake Park, Fla, the St. Lawrence Saints finally got their season started. Unfortunately, after two postponements, they didn’t want to start the season off with a 17-10 loss to Bowdoin. Bowdoin was led by Adam Tracy’s four goals and three assists, while Max Key was 18-for-27 on faceoffs. Franklin & Marshall 8, Washington &Lee 7 (OT) – Saturday, March 15 – F&M needed sophomore goalie Chris Marcozzi to make two saves in the final minute of overtime to set up the game winner by junior Mark Hild with just 28 seconds left. F&M are 4-1 under first-year head coach Todd Cavallaro. W&L drops to an unexpected 2-3. On the fly Even though the season is only a few weeks old, there has been quite a bit of up-and-down already. We took flak for some of our picks in the preseason poll, specifically Ohio Wesleyan and Denison. So far OWU, has been inconsistent going 1-4. Three of those losses came to Salisbury, Lynchburg and Gettysburg, but the loss to the Merchant Marine Academy was a surprise. They looked impressive in their loss at Salisbury. Denison, on the other hand, has won the games they should have and played the other games even tighter than anticipated with a 9-5 loss at Gettysburg and a 6-3 loss at Salisbury. That doesn’t mean Denison is happy with where they are. “A 3-2 mark with your only losses to the # 1 and # 2 teams in the country may be successful for some, but right now it stings a little,” said Denison head coach Matt McGinnis, “because all of our guys know how we had them backed in a corner, but we let them off the hook. In the mortal words of Dennis Greene, ‘They are who, we thought they were and we let them off the hook!!’ “Alex Baruch [Denison senior goalie - .720 save percentage] is playing great right now and could possibly be the best goalie in the country. [Junior middie] Dan Maude is doing an incredible job at the middle for us, and attackman Nate Hall continues to bring great field vision to our attack unit.” Mean Girls – While it won’t show up on Ithaca’s official record or statistics, on their spring break trip to California, the Bombers knocked off the Chapman Panthers 18-16. Chapman is a College Club team out in Orange, Ca. While the tight game was interesting in and of itself, there was a sub-story as well as Ithaca sophomore attackman Mike Lohan’s older sister, Lindsay (of Mean Girls, etc.) was in attendance to cheer her brother on: HYPERLINK "http://www.lindsay-lohan.net/gallery/showgallery.php/cat/1827" http://www.lindsay-lohan.net/gallery/showgallery.php/cat/1827 9 – The number of players that have greater than a 70 percent success rate at the faceoff circle at this early juncture in the season. .667 – Through three games, Geneseo St. had the best man-up in the country, scoring six goals in nine attempts. Ithaca was right behind them at 65 percent, with 13 goals on 20 attempts. Sea Gull Perch 17 – The number of saves Riley Clark needed to help overcome Denison, 6-3. Clark faced 13 shots in the fourth quarter alone. 2002 – In an NCAA quarterfinal game against Gettysburg, this was the last time that Salisbury was held to six or less goals until Denison held them to just six. 70 – Salisbury’s win streak has stretched to 70 consecutive regular season games, and they are 65-0 at Sea Gull Stadium since 2003. 3 – The number of fourth quarter goals that Salisbury needed to top Denison, 6-3. 63 – The amount of groundballs that senior Ryan Brown has already, good for tops in the country. 42 – The point total of Kean’s Scott Leathem, good for tops in the country, displacing Kylor Berkman (35), who had held that title since the start of the season. Games of the week

Thursday, March 20, 2008

Western New England College vs. Nazareth, 12:00 pm @ Vero Beach, Fla. – We were down on Nazareth because of all they lost from last year, but they’ve proven that Naz is still Naz. WNEC is about where we expected them to be.

St. Lawrence vs. Salisbury, 12:00 pm @ Sylvan Lake Park, Fla. – Not quite as intriguing after St. Lawrence fell to Bowdoin, but this is the only Northern team that Salisbury plays before the National Championship game. Looking at recent games, making the final isn’t as sure of a bet as in past years for the Gulls.

Saturday, March 22, 2008

Amherst @ Bates, 2:00 pm – Amherst is quietly undefeated. Bates is at the opposite end of that, just getting their first win and moving to 1-5. Games like this are why the NESCAC is so unique. Even though Bates has five losses, they’ve all been competitive games to top teams. Either team could win this one.

Trinity @ Colby, 10:00 am – Trinity was undefeated until they visited Villa Julie this week. Colby still is undefeated. See above as same comments about NESCAC are applicable.

Ursinus @ F&M, 1:00 pm – 6-7 a year ago, Todd Cavallaro has rejuvenated F&M and they sit at 4-1. Ursinus is 3-3, but they’re probably better than that record. Anything can happen in Centennial games.

Muhlenberg @ Gettysburg, 1:00 pm – Washington needed overtime to beat 2-2 Muhlenberg. Muhlenberg hasn’t been closer than six to the Bullets since they became varsity a couple years ago. If Gettysburg plays as sloppy as they did against Cabrini, don’t be surprised if the ‘Burg kicks it into high gear and wins by 10.

Hampden-Sydney @ Haverford, 1:00 pm – Hampden-Sydney hasn’t had more than five losses since 2000. They’re already at 2-3. A loss here would send them into the ODAC with four losses. Expect them to get things clicking soon. Haverford has some nice wins so far, but is coming off their first loss of the season. It will be interesting to see how the Black Squirrels respond.

Cortland @ Ithaca, 1:00 pm – One of the premier games in the North all season. Both are undefeated as expected and scoring more than 14 goals a game. Expect a close high scoring affair here as well.

Wesleyan @ Tufts, 1:30 pm – Neither team has quite played up to expectations. They’ll eventually figure it out and be a force come May, but for the time being, both need a convincing win here. Expect both to play fully aware of that as the NESCAC slate gets underway.

Roanoke @ Virginia Wesleyan, 1:00 pm – Roanoke looks like they’ve righted the ship with two quality wins, first over Dickinson and then over Tufts. Now a trip to play in state rival Virginia Wesleyan can either add fuel to the momentum they’ve built as the ODAC play starts or provide a setback. Virginia Wesleyan is 4-3 right now with some hard earned wins and some tough losses.

McDaniel @ Washington College, 1:00 pm – McDaniel hasn’t beaten Washington College since back in 2002 when they were called Western Maryland. The series traditionally has one goal games. In an already up-and-down year, you don’t know what to expect. Washington is 6-0, but still somewhat unproven. They’ve needed overtime to beat Muhlenberg and W&L, beat Wesley by one, and spanked some teams that they should have. Now as they get into the meat of their schedule, the real Shoremen should become apparent.

Cabrini @ Widener, 1:00 pm – Widener is 2-4, but their record won’t affect the intensity they take to the field against rival Cabrini. Cabrini won by a goal in ’06 and Widener won by a goal in ’07. Cabrini is also coming off of a heartbreaking loss against Gettysburg.

Tuesday, March 25

Middlebury @ Washington and Lee, 6:00 pm – 2-3 W&L needs a win if they want to salvage this season. Middlebury is as expected, 3-0, and just needs to stay healthy to survive their NESCAC tilts.

US Merchant Marine Academy @ Wesleyan, 7:00 pm – Just a three-goal game a year ago, look for Wesleyan to come out gunning in this one. USMMA has had a couple of tough losses so far and a strong win over OWU.