Casual Saturday afternoon MAAC action… with big implications. A weak start to the year will be forgiven if Detroit can seize its claim on a share of the conference title today.
Siena
“Saints” as in “Saint Bernards,” rather than “canonized people.” I can dig it.
April 12, 2014. Noon EDT
Titan Field
Live stats. Gameday Central.
@DetroitTitans. @SienaLacrosse.
@GreatLaxState.
Detroit preview. .pdf notes.
Lacrosse Magazine highlights.
Tempo-Free Profile
The TempoFreeLax.com numbers displayed here are up to date for this season, since there’s enough data nationally that the numbers are pretty meaningful. Siena almost always plays the toughest schedule in the MAAC, but this year they’re only No. 54 in that metric. That means these numbers have come against some weak squads.
| Siena 2014 | |
|---|---|
| Pace | 63.00 (42) |
| Poss% | 51.90 (18) |
| Off. Eff. | 27.97 (51) |
| Def. Eff. | 29.48 (26) |
| Pyth% | 51.82 (36) |
Siena slows it down a bit, especially for a MAAC team (they tend to play fast and sloppy). That’s partially on account of their ability to possess it. As we’ve seen, playing slowly with a high possession percentage means very few opportunities for the opposition.
Siena has long been a powerful offensive team (for what is effectively a mid-major playing in the MAAC), but that’s not the case this year in the least. They’re on the border of the bottom 15 nationally. Part of that is the strength of schedule adjustment, but they’ve only hit double-digits four times in ten games against that weak schedule.
The defense for the Saints has been better, but it’s not exactly an elite unit, either. Syracuse (the only truly great offense they’ve played) nearly put up 20, and the rest of the schedule – while it may be comparable to Detroit – hasn’t been filled with Tewaaraton candidates, to say the least.
All told, Siena is a very good team, but they aren’t the MAAC-obliterating, “these guys belong in a better league” type of squad that they have been in the past. They’re at the head of the pack in the conference race, but not lapping the field.
Offense
Siena’s attack unit is the focal point of the offense. Starters Richie Hurley, Colin Clive, and Jordan Barlow (two seniors and a freshman, respectively) are scorers No. 1, 3, and 4 on the roster. Hurley is the only true assist man on the team with a 19-goal, 33-assist line to date. Clive and Barlow have combined for five total assists among their 38 combined points: they’re finishers.
The best-known offensive player for the Saint coming into the year was junior Conor Prunty, and he’s mostly lived up to the hype. He has 14 goals and seven assists on the season, nowhere near Hurley’s point total, but tops for midfielders. Fifth-year midfielder Kyle Curry has 12 goals and two assists and junior Nate Barry has eight and four to close out the double-digit scorers (and offensive starters).
While there’s a huge drop from Hurley to the second tier of scorers (which includes the remainder of the offensive starters in small increments down the list), there’s an even bigger dropoff beyond those guys: this team has no depth. Players beyond those listed above have combined for eight total points on the season. Thomas Schoener is the only one with double-digit shots (though he’s primarily a defensive player).
An attack-heavy offense is a poorer matchup for Detroit than the alternative, but the Saints are turnover-heavy this year, and that plays into the Titans’ ability (though not always employed) to take the ball away from opponents. Four of the starter-types have double-digit turnovers on the year.
Defense
Redshirt sophomore Tommy Cordts has played all but 22 minutes of the season between the pipes, and he has pretty good numbers. He’s saving .538 of shots faced, allowing 9.35 goals per game. The strength of schedule adjustment would explain away some of that (raw stats against bad teams are a little obscuring), but there’s no question he’s a solid keeper. Detroit’s issues are less about shots being saved than actually putting shots on the cage, though.
Poles Brendan Meehan and Adam Hall were preseason All-league according to IL, and they’ve lived up to that. Both seniors have 14 GBs, and Hall is the team’s leader in caused turnovers with eight. Junior Jake Kissick and senior Andrew Arnold both have plenty of starts as well, so clearly Siena is listing their LSM (betting Hall based on the statistical profile, though he played close defense last year) as a starter in most games.
Junior Ryan Mallon has only a couple appearances, but still leads SSDMs in GBs. If he’s healthy, he’s dangerous. The aforementioned Schoener is the most able to cause turnovers. Freshman Devin Votta has also played that role well. Given that Siena has no offensive production outside of their starters, lots of guys are jockeying to make an impact at defensive midfield in hopes of getting a bigger offensive role.
Special Teams
Casey Dowd has taken damn-near every faceoff for the Saints this year, and has won an excellent .589 of them. Look for him to dominate in this one. He also has tons of GBs (meaning clean wins), though he almost never goes forward with it, taking only two shots on the season. Sicne he’s not an offensive threat, I’m torn on whether it makes more sense for Detroit to stick a pole (Yono) out there to muck things up, or just let Hicks go out there and try to win cleanly with the understanding that you’re going to end up playing defense more often than not.
Siena has a great clear, but not much of a ride (especially given the competition they’ve faced). Detroit’s clear has been brutal lately, of course, so the Saints could ratchet up the pressure from time to time, knowing that it’s pretty likely to cause a turnover. UDM will need to play one of its cleanest games in that phase to even out possessions and have a strong chance to win.
Siena is not particularly penalty-prone, with approximately even EMOs for themselves and opponents. They’re pretty good at converting (.417), but the man-down has really struggled, allowing a .500 clip. Given that Detroit’s man-up has been at or near the top of the country much of the year, the Titans will have to capitalize on that clear advantage in order to keep pace offensively.
Big Picture
Detroit has long been a good-not-great MAAC team (an accomplishment in itself for a relatively young program), and knocking off Siena this afternoon would give them a chance to take that next step forward and become a consistent favorite to win the league. The Titans made the NCAA Tournament last year by taking home the MAAC Tournament Championship, and the regular-season title would be another step toward program improvement.
This one also has some large implications for MAAC Tournament seeding. A Detroit win gives UDM a very good possibility of taking home the No. 1 seed, and all-but locks up a top-half finish and a game against a team behind them in the conference standings.
Predictions
Detroit has been making strides toward a more consistent program, while Siena has long been the conference hegemon. Neither team, in my estimation, is at a peak year, and in fact both are rebuilding to an extent.
- Mike Birney will finally connect on a long-range bomb for the first time in what feels like a month. Bigtime firepower is one way to intimidate even a good goalie, and that’s what Birney is known for.
- Siena’s offense is just too much for Detroit’s thin defense. Especially given that it’s attack-based (meaning UDM’s strong short-stick D-middies won’t have the impact you’d normally like), this is a good matchup for Siena. That said, if Jason Weber can steal a couple goals – something he’s certainly capable of – that can be a great equalizer.
- Even though Siena doesn’t ride hard, I expect Detroit’s problems clearing the ball to persist. Combined with what I expect to be dominance on faceoffs, that really hurst the possession game.
- The key for Detroit will be avoiding turnovers in the settled offense. They’ve been relatively clean there the past three or four weeks, so this isn’t a pipe dream. If they don’t pull it off, this one could get out of hand. If they do, that’s where your chance for an upset lies, along with Weber.
Both programs are in a down cycle, but I trust Siena’s down years to be less down than Detroit’s given the relative histories (both long-term and recent) of both teams. Detroit will have to play a darn-near perfect game to get the win. While that’s certainly possible, it’s definitely not a safe prediction. Siena gets the road win, 12-10.
Share your predictions, discussion, etc. in the comments.