Detroit 8, VMI 6

This game… it scares me about the rest of the season for the Titans. VMI went out and followed up the close call with a win over a decent Air Force squad today, but it’s still not the type of team you’re excited about beating with a fourth-quarter comeback. On its own, a win is a win. For what it means about the rest of the season, cracks are showing.

Tempo Free

From the official box score, a look at the tempo-free stats:

Since both teams play pretty fast mostly on account of opponents’ scoring (and neither squad did much of that yesterday), this didn’t play out too speedy – but it was still above average in tempo. That tempo was mostly controlled by VMI thanks to faceoff wins.

Both defenses played well… or it’s probably more accurate (as we’ll see in a moment) to say both offenses played really, really poorly. A four-goal run by Detroit in the second half was the difference in the game, since the teams scored two apiece in each of the first three quarters.

Notes

Um, faceoffs? What? VMI entered the game as one of the worst faceoff teams in the nation, and even with a dominating performance against Detroit (75%), top specialist Mitch Wilson is a still a couple more great games from even sniffing .500. With Detroit’s quality on draws, they should have been able to win this battle. Damien Hicks went 0/7, Jordan Yono (who’s in there with getting draw wins probably not his top priority) 0/2, and only freshman Benjamin Gjokaj won a single attempt, cracking 50% at 4/7. Detroit has some good options, and if things aren’t going well, they should be able to change it up. A specialist shouldn’t be yanked for one loss, but if he’s winning and Hicks isn’t, I’d leave Gjokaj in the game.

The other aspect of possession went relatively well for the Titans. While they failed a couple clears, they held VMI to a 20/25 performance, which could have tipped possession in a big way with an average day on faceoffs. It’s a baby step back toward that heavy aggressive defense we’ve seen the Titans revert to each of the past few years, and something to watch when they enter conference play.

Offensively, something isn’t clicking right. Detroit turned it over 18 times on 35 possessions – more than half their opportunities with the ball – and it’s clear that, despite some players with good sticks, something is going wrong with valuing possession. The main culprit was Alex Maini (though I hardly blame a player who gets the burden of carrying the ball so much) with five, but eight other Titans turned it over as well. That includes two from Tom Masterson, Brandon Beauregard, Nick Garippa, and JD Hess.

Another issue for UDM – and another one that seems to be recurring – is shooting accuracy. Things were better in this one than they were against Robert Morris, but the Titans still aimed only 27 of 47 shots (.574) on cage. When the opposing keeper is having a great day, making 19 saves on those 27 SOGs, there has to be more urgency to be accurate (or scarier yet, you’re making things easier on him by lobbing the ball into his chest or missing completely).

Since defense was the name of the game, let’s look there first. Detroit caused nine turnovers on 40 VMI possessions (the Keydets chipped in eight more unforced) for a pretty good day. If the opponent can’t even get a shot off, they’re going to have a really tough time scoring – it’s science. Paul Bitetti had four forced TOs, the only Titan with multiple.

The key portion of the defense, however, was the goalie play. After the Michigan game, coach Matt Holtz mentioned that freshman Jason Weber would certainly get his opportunities (when eligible after violating team rules) to win the job, and Weber took a big step toward accomplishing that goal. He allowed just six goals and made 16 saves – including six in the decisive fourth quarter – of a two-goal game. Detroit’s offensive pressure petered out in the second half, but he helped what offense they could muster be the deciding factor.

Moving to that offense, there were some strong performances clustered among a small group of UDM players. Shayne Adams had three goals – though that came in nine(!) shots on goal and 11(!) total shots. Most of his scoring comes in close, and usually he’s not stuffed by the keeper so much. I would bet it’s a one-game anomaly. Alex Maini had four assists, but didn’t score himself on three shots, all on goal. Tom Masterson had two goals and two assists, and Mike Birney had one of each (with his custom of taking a ton of shots, only half of which are on cage).

The offense is there for Detroit, it just needs to be fine-tuned and executing needs to improve both when it comes to turning the ball over and the simple act of putting the ball in the goal (which, it must be noted, is the point of lacrosse). The midfield was more involved in this one than they had been in recent contests, and that should help open things up for the attack. Mike Birney is going to stretch a defense, but only if he’s a threat to score, not just whistle it over the keeper’s head.

VMI goalie Evan Windisch had a strong game in the loss, saving 19 shots and allowing just eight goals (though as mentioned above, I think some of that is execution mistakes by the Titans). Attack Ben Huger was involved on four of VMI’s six goals with one himself to go along with three assists.

Elsewhere

Official box score. TFL boxscore. Detroit recap. VMI recap.

Up Next

I’ve revised expectations firmly downward for the Titans, at least until conference play begins in a few weeks. VMI is a really bad team, and to basically escape with a win against them is, frankly, something other bad teams will do. It doesn’t help matters that the next opponent is both coming to town on short rest for UDM and also really good. Detroit hosts Bellarmine at noon Tuesday inside Ultimate Soccer Arenas in Pontiac, and the Knights have been playing at a top-ten level early in the year. It’s a tall test, and one that we haven’t seen Detroit pass in recent years.

The goal for this season, like last year, will be to fine-tune things and get ready for a solid run through conference play in hopes of returning to the NCAA Tournament. It may be a tall task, but things looked even worse at this point last year – the Titans were 0-4 with some questionable losses (blowouts to Navy and Robert Morris), but got things together for MAAC play enough to squeeze into the conference championship and run through that for an NCAA berth. Things are looking the same for 2014.