So Michigan is playing well in the most recent stretch of games, but the team’s biggest weakness has been facing an exceptional attackman. Good thing they’re not facing the reigning Tewaaraton winner today…
Colgate
Both flag and torch double as lacrosse sticks. Illegal equipment flag is down.
3:00 p.m. EST – ESPNU
March 17, 2013
Flushing, NY (Citi Field)
Colgate tailgate information(!). Pregame notes.
Michigan pregame notes. .pdf notes.
Live stats.
Airs on ESPNU, also streaming on ESPN3.com.
Part of the Metropolitan Lacrosse Classic, hosted by the New York Mets. The second game of a double-header (Navy and Holy Cross play at noon).
Tempo-Free Profile
With TempoFreeLax.com fully up to date, the numbers shown here are adjusted for the strength of schedule (Marist has played the nation’s No. 27 toughest schedule to date).
| Colgate 2013 | |
|---|---|
| Pace | 71.00 (18) |
| Poss% | 50.91 (23) |
| Off. Eff. | 33.19 (22) |
| Def. Eff. | 28.65 (27) |
| Pyth% | 63.84 (22) |
Colgate plays a pretty fast brand of lacrosse – good for T.V. – and edges just ahead of opponents in terms of the proportion of those possessions. That means a lot of Raider possessions in games.
That gives a high-powered Colgate offense plenty of opportunities to put the ball in the back of the net (doesn’t hurt that they take .644 shots per possession). The offense has taken a distinct step back from last year’s ridiculous output, but it’s still pretty good (and talented). The defense has also taken a slight step back, but not quite as pronounced. All told, this has been a fringe top-20 team to date.
Let’s take a closer look at the personnel and what makes this team go.
Offense
Hey have you heard of Peter Baum? Oh, OK. He had unreal offensive numbers last year, scoring a goal on more than one out of every ten Raider possessions and assisting on five percent of them. That means he had a hand in scoring on nearly 15% of Colgate possessions, and the team as a whole scored on about 36% of them. That’s good.
The senior attackman’s numbers aren’t nearly as good this year, accompanied by a general slide for the whole offense. Sophomore Ryan Walsh has stepped up to rival Baum’s production to date, however, with 17 goals and four assists to Baum’s 20 and nine. He’s also huge for an attackman, standing 6-4, 238.
Sophomore midfielder Matt Clarkson has eight goals and eight assists, while a pair of juniors – midfielder Jimmy Ryan and attackman Brendon McCann – have identical nine goal, four assist outputs.
The “single great attackman” offense has been a killer for Michigan this year, and facing one of the country’s best sure isn’t their dream matchup. Even if the Wolverines manage to somehow slow down Baum, that will likely open things up for McCann. There are a lot of options here, despite the offense not being exceptional this year.
Defense
Like the offense, the defense hasn’t lived up to last year’s high marks. However, it’s still a pretty good unit. Juniors Bobby Lawrence and Kevin Boyle lead non-faceoff specialists in caused turnovers and ground balls (Boyle is listed as a defenseman but has not starts – he’s likely your LSM).
Senior James Queeney and sophomore Matt Yeager have started every game along with Lawrence, but haven’t put up big GB numbers to date. Lawrence and Boyle are clearly the dangermen on the defensive unit.
The goalkeeping situation has been split between junior Conor Murphy and freshman Gordon Santry. Santry has more starts (four to three) and a little bit more time between the pipes, but Murphy has earned the starting position after Santry started the year. He has a significantly better goals against average (7.92 to 11.84) and save percentage (.508 to .418), though neither has been exceptional in any respect.
Special Teams
Faceoffs are a slight advantage for the Raiders – at 52.05%, they’re No. 25 in the country. Sophomore Alex Kinnealy is 1/9 in the only duty taken by a player other than senior Robert Grabher (“Her” here meaning the clamp on a faceoff, clearly). Grabher is at .540 on the year, and has .724 as many ground balls as he does wins – he picks them up himself quite a bit (it doesn’t appear from this other stats that he’s a significant O- or D-middie) in other phases of the game). He’s a weapon for the Raiders.
Colgate is just above-average in the clearing game, and against a team like Michigan that is middle-of-the-road in riding (after being a hard-riding team last year, they’ve switched it up to prevent transition opportunities), so expect standard results there. On the other end, Colgate is one of the hardest-riding teams in the country this year (No.9). Michigan – after starting the year very well on the clear – has slid back to No. 50 in the country. They’ve gone in fits and starts – other than brutal performances against Army and High Point, things haven’t been bad – so expecting any sort of consistency is a little premature.
Colgate takes a lot of penalties in comparison to opponents, the opposite of Michigan (though a couple rough games have brought things closer to even), and doesn’t convert nearly as well as opponents, despite the offensive talent on the roster. At this point, it’s fair to expect EMOs – both in sheer volume and conversion – to favor Michigan against most teams.
Big Picture
Michigan’s second big nationally televised is an opportunity to represent the brand to world, and like the Hopkins game, I think the Wolverines will do a little better than expected. “Expected,” however, is a pretty rough outing, so we’ll see just how close U-M can keep things.
This probably isn’t one of the winnable contests left on the schedule, but it’s also one in which the Wolverines can prevent themselves from being blown out by slowing things down and making Colgate’s offense – again, not nearly the unit it was last year – earn what it gets.
Predictions
Whether Michigan will actually be able to slow things down might be the biggest question…
- I don’t think it’s happening, though. One way to speed up pace? Convert a lot of goals. Colgate has the type of personnel – one exceptional attackman and a good enough supporting cast – that can really make Michigan pay. Expect Michigan’s fastest game of the year (previously 77 against Hopkins).
- Peter Baum hasn’t been as ridiculous as last year, but this game is an opportunity for him to do a whole lot of scoring. Five-plus goals and a couple assists should be a nice day at the office for him.
- Brad Lott (or Charlie Keady) should be able to stalemate Grabher on draws. He’s a big factor in pushing things on clean wins, so mucking things up in the middle and letting the wing players get around 40% of the GBs will be a good day. Beating him straight-up would be a surprise, but is possible, too.
- Gerald Logan – as has become the status quo – will steal a couple goals from Colgate, but will also have a tough task playing behind his defense. U-M’s back line should be healthiest they have been in a while, but they’ve still struggled most of the year.
- Michigan should get a couple EMO goals in this game. Colgate plays pretty rough, and the man-down defense isn’t great. That phase is one of Michigan’s few strengths, so expect them to capitalize.
I’ve stressed enough times that Colgate isn’t last year’s juggernaut, but the Raiders are still trotting out a really good team, so Michigan – while the Wolverines aren’t going to admit defeat before the contest – probably isn’t expecting to win. They won’t. Colgate takes it, 16-6.
Share your predictions, discussion, etc. in the comments.
UM was missing three starters at D for the Fairfield game, according to the boxscore. Johnson, Swaney (who’s been out for awhile) and Orr. Are they injured? Since they didn’t play at all, have to figure it’s injuries rather than dropping down the depth chart. Do any of those three play today? Without them the D is much younger, and no matter how talented you are a young D is usually not a good D (see Michigan basketball).
Johnson and Swaney have definitely been injured (and were approaching full health last I heard, with the possibility of playing today). Not positive on Orr’s status, but his seems to be injury-related as well.
Although I’ve learned the hard way not to disagree with Tim’s predictions, my guess is that the score differential is closer than 10 goals, say around five or so. UM will up its game when it’s on a big stage like the nationally televised game (which I’ll get to see on ESPNU in DC). My only trepidation is that this game is the back end of a long road swing and I don’t know how drained the team is from all the traveling. That could push the differential higher.
Just looking at it, they have that type of offensive personnel that has been killing Michigan: a really good attackman has been able to tear the Wolverine D to shreds, regardless of who’s healthy enough to play. Obviously I’d love to see them shut Baum down, but without an advantage on faceoffs (which in my opinion can be almost random on a given day, though meaningful in aggregate) they won’t be able to keep up.
With a really fast pace of play, keeping it within 10 goals really depends on how much of the last couple games is the team seriously taking strides, and how much was just the little pieces of randomness that occur within a game.
Tim: you can call me Nostralaxmus now for my ability to foretell the lacrosse future. Only kidding, I just had a gut feel that UM would keep it somewhat close.
Honestly I think we are seeing the young guys growing up here. The schedule is still brutal and wins will be tough, but this team looked so much better than the team I saw play bellarmine earlier this year. Face offs, defense and clearing have all been looking better. Our attack is dependable but I think we are missing that playmaker there that a few teams we played all seem to have. We definitely have some middies that can make plays though.