Michigan Preview: Army

Michigan’s long road swing continues, and is soon to pick up the pace with mid-week games the next two weeks, as well.

Army

Sword not strung to 2013 spec.

7:30 p.m. EST March 2, 2013
Sun Life Stadium, Miami, Fla.
Live Stats. @UMichLacrosse.
Airs on Sun Sports Sunday at 3 p.m.

Tempo-Free Profile

Army is one of the few teams that have played more games than Michigan’s three so far. That gives us a reasonable base of data to draw conclusions about team quality. Thus far, they’re .500 on the year, but that doesn’t say a whole lot. VMI and Manhattan account for the wins, while ranked UMass and Syracuse teams have dealt them losses.

Army is running on a pretty big possession deficit this year, thanks for the most part to having far fewer clearing opportunities than opponents. Even though they’re making the most of those chances, they’re still running at 48% possession, which would have been just outside last year’s bottom ten.

Their offensive efficiency, then, is impressive (again, thanks in part to not wasting any possessions on failed clears). They’re making more of their possessions than opponents.

Offense

The offense is led by a well known name nationally in senior attackman Garrett Thul, a third-team All-America selection last year. He’s joined atop Army’s scoring chart to date by midfielder John Glesener at 14 points a pop. Sophomore midfielder Alex Newsome isn’t far behind with 12. Thul is almost exclusively a finisher, as has been senior middie Alex Van Krevel to date this season, with three total goals. Everyone else on the roster is pretty balanced.

Michigan doesn’t have the top-notch No. 1 defenseman to completely shut down a particular player, which it seems would otherwise be the strategy against a player like Thul. That Army is assisting on nearly 70% of goals is troublesome as well, given Michigan’s early-season woes with slide-and-recovery.

Defense

Defensively, Army’s numbers are pretty good, but that’s partially due to: a game against Syracuse in the dome wherein the Orange only score six times but were never even remotely threatened by the Black Knights, and games against two of last year’s worst overall teams and offenses.

Anyway, Jon Burk, Pat Hart, and Brendan Buckley have started all four Army games to date. Buckley leads the unit with six caused turnovers and six ground balls. The other two have a single caused TO between them, so this hasn’t been much of a takeaway unit to date.

In goal, two players have nearly split time, with Sam Somers getting three starts to Bobby Sincero’s one, even though Sincero has played about a half hour more game time on the year. Somers is by far the superior option based on the stats, despite playing the entire game against Syracuse while Sincero’s full game played is Manhattan.

Special Teams

Matt Mezer and Alex Daly have mostly split faceoffs, with Daly slightly above .500 and Mezer slightly below. However their attempts are low enough still that some of that is just noise. This should be an opportunity for Brad Lott to pick up where he left off at halftime against Bellarmine.

Army’s clear has been outstanding this year… as has their ride. They have had far more opportunities to practice the latter than the former (thanks mostly to getting lit up by UMass). Michigan’s clear was awful last year, but things have really tightened up, and they’re no longer inept. The ride – with fewer deployments of the 10-man – hasn’t been as excellent as it was last year. This one reads like a stalemate.

Army has committed an equal number of penalties to opponents, and converted at about the same clip. Michigan is playing a pretty clean brand of lacrosse (as they did last year), and like Army, is converting at about the same rate – exactly 3/11, actually.

Big Picture

Michigan wasn’t expecting to come off last year and suddenly play tournament-caliber lacrosse, but the Bellarmine result, at least, was disappointing. If anything, the Penn State and Johns Hopkins games could be considered encouraging.

However, moral victories each count as 0% of an actual victory, and Team Two is still seeking its first of the latter. This would be a huge victory to get, given that Army appears to be a decent – if unspectacular – squad.

Predictions

Michigan is coming off a week-long break before starting (continuing, as it were) a fairly grueling road trip. Army’s tough stretch is in the rearview, but it’s also prepared the Black Knights to play a relatively easy opponent like Michigan. The Wolverines also have the year’s most winnable game up next, so it’s odd to call this one a “trap game,” but it kind of is.

• For the first time this season, Michigan wins the faceoff battle. Brad Lott is back, has been practicing with the team for a couple weeks now. Against a mediocre faceoff team, that should finally pay off in results.
• Michigan’s defense will have serious struggles against a fairly potent Army attack. Thul wouldn’t be out of place on the Johns Hopkins offense that tore the Wolverines to shreds, and there are certainly the supporting pieces present to make the Wolverines’ slow-reacting defense struggle.
• Michigan – as they have in every game so far – will give up a stretch of 2-3 goals or more, most coming in transition and leaving Gerald Logan out to dry.
• The U-M offense will have a surprisingly effective day. The Wolverines’ freshmen are starting to come around, and even if Thomas Paras isn’t back to health, they should be able to start capitalizing on flashes of that potential.

Michigan has more potential to improve over the course of the year than most (Marquette and High Point), but there’s still a ways to go to reach Army’s level. The Wolverines will come as close to a win as they have this year, but fall short in a 13-10 Army win.