Major League Lacrosse :      August 16, 2001 [ The Game Story]
New Jersey Pride 14 Rochester Rattlers 19 Scoring: Scoring: Jon Hess Jesse Hubbard Jay Jalbert Chris Massey Christian Cook Scott Urick Tom Ryan David Curry (2, 5) (3, 2) (4, 0) (2, 0) (0, 1) (1, 0) (1, 0) (1, 0) John Grant Darcy Sweet Jake Bergey Tracey Kelusky Tim Soudan John Fay Ryan Powell (5, 4) (7, 1) (2, 3) (2, 0) (2, 0) (1, 0) (0, 1) Saves: Saves: Steve Koudelka Trevor Tierney 6  (0.300) 0  (0.000) Brian Dougherty Adam Platzer 18  (0.581) 2  (0.667) Current Record :     (7-5) Current Record :     (8-4) Team Page For 2001 Team Page For 2001       The Game Story:

The battle started right from the first whistle; Tom Ryan got tangled up in a shoving match on the faceoff that wasn't dispersed until the refs came flying in. New Jersey controlled, but as Hubbard moved from left to right across the top, Rochester's Thorpe whirlibirded him with a well-timed slap to the back of the knees. Koudelka then stopped his first challenge on the night and he immediately fired an outlet pass up the middle for a breaking Dave Stilley in the center of the field. Thorpe, on the other end, recognized the break early and tried to beat Stilley to the outlet for a crushing hit, but Thorpe was a step too late, and Stilley bumped it to Hubbard on his left. Thorpe had left Hubbard for the slide upfield, so Hubbard buried the one on none for the first tally of the night, a 1-0 NJ lead. The next several minutes were characterized by some violent checking and great position defense. It looks as if most of the players have ditched their old habits about not cross-checking.

Rochester finally got on the board when Grant drifted (as much as a slow, 230-pounder can drift) into the middle from the wing to Koudelka's left as Stilley was doing his damnedest to shove him out. But Stilley gave too much ground and Grant powered an overhand lefty low by Koudelka. Jersey caught a little bit of a break halfway through the first when Bergey got flagged for holding, but the Pride could only rotate it around the outside on the EMO, and Brian Dougherty always had a good look at their occasional rips. The EMO was symptomatic of the Rattler defense as a whole -- NJ, except for a slashing Curry drive down the middle, could not seem to crack Rochester's perimeter wall of tough, feet-moving, body-checking defense. Thorpe was now covering Urick with a shorti so they could free up a longstick for a middie.

A little flurry of scoring rounded out the first quarter. Fay put Rochester up 2-1 when, after some rotation left to right across the top, he nailed an outside underhanded righty rip. But NJ answered almost immediately when Hess grabbed the ball behind and looked the field over after no one came to pressure him. Five seconds later he found Hubbard camped out on the right pipe with almost no angle and pushed it to him for a surgical feed and dump. Oddly enough, Rochester didn't seem all that intent on pressuring Hess behind throughout the first -- they were comfortable covering just the front of the goal and daring Hess to try and dodge. NJ then went up 3-2 when Hubbard, on the left wing, found Curry cutting down the center to the right pipe. Curry finished low on an overhand righty. One more for NJ to end the quarter: Koudelka ran one over himself on a clear and dumped it to Ryan on his left, who then ripped one lefty but wide. Hess rushed to get the ball-in and drove righty from behind the goal. He found Urick in the lefty shooter's spot, and after the low to high feed Urick buried it. On the next face, in a sign of things to come, Jalbert wiped out Mollett on the wing, and as Mollett lay hurt on the ground, Sweet started shoving Jalbert.

NJ started the second period man-down from that incident, although I'm not sure what the call was. Some smart, time-killing, spread-field clearing from Koudelka and company ran out the clock on the penalty. But Rochester didn't need the extra man, and made it 4-3 on a beautiful series: Doc made a cat-like save to the five hole and bumped it up to Bishko on the break, who pulled a sweet side-step at the top of the arc and hit Powell on the 4-3 point to his left, who then skipped it to Grant opposite low, who then pushed it across the mouth of the goal to Sweet on the pipe, who then, well, stuck it. But the Pride came right back again when, on a weak push call against a Massey goal-line extended drive, they found themselves with an EMO. Massey took a routine feed up top from Hess behind and just blasted it by Doc to push their lead to 5-3. Rochester closed the gap shortly after when Kelusky streaked in on a straight line from the wing to Koudelka's left and nailed a low angle, righty overhand to the top corner. Then Grant cleaned up some garbage on the left pipe after Powell missed (after 5 pump fakes) a lay-up on the right pipe, which itself followed a sick behind the back pass from Sweet as he was falling to his knees. It was now tied at five all, and things were about to get even more interesting. The last even-up score for some time forward, a 6-5 Rattler lead, would occur when Grant drove on Stilley, again from behind left, and Grant got a step (and a free lefty cradle) as he moved across the crease. Grant stuck it on Koudleka, who had no choice but to guess. Then there was a neat little rumble.

Ryan Powell set himself up off to Koudelka's right and bolted for the goal with a little inside position. His diving launch across the goal was snuffed by Koudelka, and Powell landed in the crease to the right of the goal. Then, at least a full second later, Tom Ryan drove his shoulders into Powell, who was just lying on the ground defenseless. It was a goonish cheapshot, and everyone responded as such -- the dust didn't settle on the ensuing fracases until about five minutes later. And just like hockey, little undercards were popping up on the fringes of the main battle. When the refs finally got everything sorted out, NJ would be down 4 guys for 3 minutes (Koudelka, Ryan, Stilley, Curry) and Rochester 2 for 3 minutes (Powell, Regan). Trevor Tierney started getting warmed up on the sidelines, but given that he was going in to face a 4 on 2 for 3 minutes, I'm not sure what the point was. So if you've never seen a 4 on 2 before then I'll describe it for you: Grant to Sweet, Kelusky to Grant, Grant to Bergey, Grant to Sweet, Sweet to Grant. Needless to say, the fans weren't all that happy. Making matters worse for New Jersey was the fact that after each one of those ridiculously easy goals, Chris Cercy went nuts on the faceoff. Jacobs didn't win one until it was 11-5, and he ran out the twilight of the penalties. So it was now all even, and Koudelka was back in goal, but Rochester wasn't done scoring. Bergey drove the top right of the arc, faked an underhand dump to Soudan trailing on his right, then faked the drive, then actually overhanded it to Soudan, who was still keeping pace. Soudan took the open lane and finished for a 12-5 lead. The half was nearly over except for a weird incident (well, probably not weird if you have a huge bag on an offset). Powell was driving the left wing on Reid Jackson, and Jackson ripped the stick away from Powell on a strong slap across his chest. The stick must have flown 5 yards. While everyone was looking for the loose ball, Powell ran back to his stick, grabbed it, and started cradling again -- the ball never left.

The Pride had a lot of catching up to do to start the third, but they made a good run at it. Hess got the ball behind after some rotation and took Abrams to the hoop around the left side. Abrams threw several checks, but gave up a little position in the process -- Hess gained the corner and ripped one lefty low to low on Doc. But Soudan pulled off a beauty of a one on one down on the other end. As Soudan drove from the top of the arc, Jalbert stepped up to meet him with an aggressive charge. But, in a loud collision, Soudan bounced off Jalbert and skirted to the right for a righty outside rip that beat Koudelka. Jalbert got knocked backwards and to the ground. Then New Jersey went on a comeback of sorts.

Hubbard banged one in on an outside burner for a 7-13 score, and the Pride defense started playing much better body with their shortsticks and becoming more active checkers with their longsticks (Grant was told by one of the refs "you're whining" after, well, whining about a slash). Then Abrams got nabbed for a hold on the wing and NJ went up for :30 seconds. On the EMO, NJ tried their normal bait and switch across the top of the arc, but the outside rip went wide. Hess gathered the inbound and threaded it to Jalbert at top center for a high to high bullet that landed just under the crossbar. Rochester momentarily delayed NJ's comeback when Sweet, in heavy traffic, finished a sharp Bishko feed from the wing to make it 14-8, but NJ rattled off three goals to end the third. Tom Ryan got tangled up with Mollett during the next faceoff when Ryan was blatantly holding Mollet's stick, but Mollett retaliated so it would be 5 on 5 for a while. With both teams short, Jalbert pulled a kamikaze dive going left to right that found the far pipe and hurt Doc's knee in the process. Then Hess drew two slashes on Abrams while lolligagging up top -- Abrams just kept wailing on Hess' off-stick arm. It would now be a 6 on 4 for NJ (Thorpe got a hold on the same series). Curry took it up top, whipped it to Hess behind left, and Hess immediately found Massey cutting to the pipe for a sharp looking goal. Both penalties got released, but when Doc tried to clear it himself on the Rattlers first possession after the goal, Massey picked Doc as he was crossing the midfield line. Doc, fifty yards away from his goal, turned and slashed Massey, who was already heading the other way, but Doc eventually recovered and NJ ran out the shot clock. On the EMO, with Adam Platzer now in goal, Jalbert barely missed on a sick rip from up top, but Hess again took the inbound right away and snuck hard around the left side to catch Rochester's wing defense off guard for an underhand lefty to Platzer's five hole. Time expired in the third about 5 seconds later and NJ was back to within three.

NJ longstick Joe Ceglia got flagged with an off-ball hold on Bishko (Ceglia definitely wasn't smooth about it), but it never mattered -- Powell, on the left wing, saw Sweet cutting down the middle in a lot of traffic and nailed him with a sweet behind the back feed from 10 yards away. But NJ came back with a run on which they had numbers (initiated by a nice Koudelka clear) and Massey, running the point, hit Hubbard on the left pipe, who fed across to Ryan on the right pipe for a dunk and a 15-12 Rochester lead.

Powell then finally notched his first point of the night. On a tenuous fast break above the arc, Powell pulled off a sick fake shot as Mollet was flying at him on the 4-3 point, and Powell stepped into the middle (with Mollett still flying by) to hit Sweet on his bottom left for a one on none dip and dunk. Then the Rattlers buffered the lead even farther and clearly took the wind out of NJ. Sweet was the recipient of a nice Bergey feed as Bergey drove left from up top, and Sweet tallied his seventh on the night. The main difference down the stretch is that while both goalies were making the routine saves, it was only Doc that came up huge every now and then -- Koudelka never made the crowd gasp. Also, Rochester's short stick defense was outstanding, and their ability to knock down balls in the passing lanes caused NJ fits. And speaking of saves, after Bergey nailed another for Rochester on a steamrolling split dodge to his left, Doc pulled off the stuff of the game; Tom Ryan got a step on his guy when he took him from behind right and with space in front of the goal. Doc vacuumed up the dropped stick blast in one smooth motion and ran outside the crease to start the clear. It was as if Doc had already seen it on replay.

New Jersey closed out the game on some sturdy work from Jalbert. First, he busted ass on a coast to coast run that drew a hold on Mike Regan, but on the EMO Hess was telegraphing his feeds from X, so Chris Schiller (among others) delighted in picking them off. Second, and to close out the scoring on the night, Jalbert wound up and blasted a two-pointer high on Doc from just outside the arc. It would get New Jersey up to 14 goals, but when the final whistle blew, the Pride were on pretty shaky ground in the playoff picture.