Lax Links: April 26, 2012

Link City. As always, if you have something you’d like to share, the e-mail and twitter inboxes are always open.

High School

Lookin' good, even in defeat.

Usually game scores aren’t enough to make a Lax Links post, but I’m a sucker for attached pictures. Country Day took down Cranbrook 11-9 last night.

Nick Buckley talks the growth of lacrosse in the Battle Creek Enquirer‘s coverage area.

“People always say it’s a Detroit and a Grand Rapids game, but Lansing has started to make a pocket for themselves as well,” said Harper Creek boys’ club head coach Ben Siebert. “You’ve got Lakeview and Pennfield, hopefully within a year or two us as well. You have the Portage schools and Kalamazoo teams. We have enough teams. If some team has the right guys in enough spots, one of us could make a run.”

It’s probably a long way off before a Southwest Michigan team makes a deep run into the playoffs – Portage Central is the area’s top team, at No. 22 in the Laxpower rankings in the state.

Former Ann Arbor Pioneer coach Bob Stevenson was selected to the Michigan State Lacrosse Coaches’ Association’s Hall of Fame, along with six other (worthy) honorees.

Photo gallery from Rockford’s Lax vs. Cancer game against FHC. The Rams won 7-6, but most importantly, raised nearly 12K for cancer research.

Brother Rice makes LaxPower’s national top 25. ESPNHS isn’t quite so kind to the Warriors, but Rice clocks in at No. 41 on their Fab 50.

Detroit

Women’s lacrosse senior Emily Boissonneault received Detroit’s highest athletics honor with the President’s Award as most outstanding female student-athlete. Also from the Detroit awards luncheon, men’s lacrosse sophomore Shayne Adams received the Dad Butler Award for overcoming injury. He suffered a knee tear in the Titans’ penultimate game last season, and has rebounded to become the Titans’ second-leading scorer (with a good chance to claim first, pending the status of Joel Matthews).

Detroit was a banquet-heavy program in the past week, with the lacrosse team also holding their year-end soiree. Your individual award winners:

• Shayne Adams – offensive player of the year.
• Jamie Hebden – defensive player of the year.
• John Nowicki – coaches’ award.
• A.J. Levell – team MVP.

Congrats to all four, and of course to the first four-year senior class in Titan program history. Photo gallery from the banquet.

Jacksonville press release says the Dolphins are definitely in the MAAC Tournament, but I’m fairly certain that’s not quite the case yet. There are some scenarios (OK, one scenario, and an unlikely one) in which they miss out.

Michigan

Former Michigan defender Harry Freid (now a 5th-year senior at St. John’s, and a starting defender for the Red Storm) foresees big things in the future for the Wolverines:

Hi @DaveBrandonAD got to watch my first@UMichLacrosse game of the year. Special things to come for the driven group

ESPN’s Paul Carcaterra chimes in with a similar sentiment:

Hats off 2 @UMichLacrosse 4 bringing it year 1. Not 1 recruiting class on campus….tells you what they had in past & where they R going.

Sure, feelgood quotes are ultimately meaningless, but it’s nice to have people talking positively about you in the midst of a 1-12 season.

MCLA

Davenport’s 16-9 win over Hope earned them the CCLA North Division Championship.

More PR-penned Davenport news. Preview of the Panthers’ CCLA Tournament opener against Aquinas this Saturday.

Clark Bell photo gallery from Michigan State’s 16-8 win over Toledo on Sunday.

Photos from the Grand Valley-Calvin game last week. Grand Valley won 31-5. Photos from the GVSU-Ferris State game Saturday, which the Lakers won 24-2.

T.V. details are available for the MCLA Championships. Once again, the semis and finals will air on Fox College Sports, Thursday, May 17 (D-1 semis) and Saturday, May 19 (D-2 and D-1 Finals). Michigan teams have a great shot to make the D-2 final, and Michigan State has been close to making a run in recent seasons in D-1.

The Next Level

This is not typically a section in Lax Links, what with a dedicated category of posts, but the Oakland Press talks about Brother Rice graduates Nick Dolik and Danny Henneghan, two key players in Penn State’s resurgence as a program.

“Both of these guys play key roles on the field for us,” Penn State second-year head coach Jeff Tambroni said. “They did a great job of buying into a brand-new system last year. Both of them were recruited by the previous coach and went through the adversity of playing for a new coaching staff. But, to their credit, both have adjusted very well.”

That’s not America’s most glowing quote of all time, but it’s good to see the two Mitten State natives getting some ink.

Recruiting

Dexter senior Patrick Rogers has committed to Hendrix College, a D-3 program in Conway, Ark.

St. Anthony’s (N.Y.) junior midfielder Kimberly Coughlan has committed to Michigan. If my timeline is right, she’ll be a freshman on the inaugural squad in 2014.

As always, thanks for visiting and don’t hesitate to drop me any news tips, game reports, etc.