This post is obviously quite late this year. Apologies. While I would like this to be a comprehensive list, I’m undoubtedly missing some. E-mail me if you know of a summer camp not listed here.
Due to blogger sluggishness, a lot of things have slipped through the cracks (including some that have already passed). If I’m missing something here – and I almost certainly am – don’t hesitate to email me.
Faceoffs were often a struggle for UDM in 2011 (and 2012)
This post might feel familiar: I made a similar one last summer. To sum up that article, I figured the Titans would perform a bit better on faceoffs in 2012 than they did in 2011, though that was more based on “feel” than the stats contained in the post.
While the Titans did improve – they won .428 of faceoffs compared to .409 the previous season – it was still not enough to even out the possession game. While faceoffs weren’t the biggest problem for the Titans (that would be the offense, which was regularly a trainwreck in the short-lived tenure of coordinator Bill Tully), they were far from a strength.
The Personnel
The Titans went with two primary faceoff specialists in 2012, after mostly riding Brandon Davenport in 2011. Davenport (.446) was slightly better than he had been the previous year, and Tyler Corcoran (.465) was even better than that.
Part of what made the Titans struggle was the use of non-specialists on faceoffs. In 2011, 21 faceoffs were taken by non-specialists (Davenport, Joe MacLean, and Corcoran), and those players won just three of them, good for .143.
This season, non-specialists (MacLean didn’t take any faceoffs despite regular playing time as a defensive midfielder, so only Davenport and Corcoran apply here, though underclassman Tyler Harper, brought in as a faceoff specialist, does) took 36 faceoffs, winning just seven, good for .194.
Obviously, there are strategic reasons to voluntarily concede a faceoff to prevent fastbreak situations, so even though those hurt the overall number, they don’t affect the win rate when UDM was actually trying to win a draw.
Going Forward
It’s clear Davenport and Corcoran are your top two guys. Both started the year poorly – that’s bound to happen against excellent faceoff specialists from Delaware, UNC, and others – and rebounded to draw about even on the year. Here are their cumulative win percentages over the course of the year:
Both improved over the course of the year.
Both finished on the uptick, but it appears Davenport leveled out at around .450 and Corcoran’s numbers were still improving. That could be a matter of sample size – more of Davenport’s draws came early in the year, whereas Corcoran had more attempts in later games.
My “gut feel” at the end of the year was that Corcoran was impressing to close out the season, and the numbers definitely appear to bear that out. Another feeling I had? The more attempts either player had, the better he seemed to perform. That’s one to be careful with, since the causal relationship can go in either direction (he’s winning more because he’s getting in a rhythm, or he’s just getting more reps because he started out playing well), but it’s still notable.
Win% by attempts.
As you can see, both performed better with more attempts. The difference – aside from a much more “boom or bust” status with Corcoran – is in the slope of the line. Corcoran’s is about 0.83% improvement per faceoff, with a maximum number of attempts at 15. Davenport’s is around 0.45% per faceoff, with a maximum attempts of 26.
As noted above, there are a lot of confounding factors at play, but it might be worth giving Corcoran the chance to win the job next year.
Conclusion
As noted in last year’s post, there are several factors that go into improvement on faceoffs. Here, I’m looking mostly at how the top two options are used. Both had moments of brilliance and struggle last year, with a much wider spread for Tyler Corcoran.
Better overall team health next year (a variety of SSDMs missed significant time last season, and though there’s no way of knowing which impacted the performance on faceoffs, it probably played a factor) should be a benefit to the performance, and yet again, I think the Titans will edge toward .500.
“We had some nerves that had to work their way out,” Quinn said. “We’ve been there before but it’s been a few years. Obviously being the defending champions, Detroit Country Day was ready to jump on us during the game, but we had a talk at halftime and dug our way out of the hole.”
The championship game was the closest game of the playoffs for the Rangers, who entered the title bout with a 14-game win streak that began on April 24th. Forest Hills Central outscored their first five playoff opponents by a combined 73-8.
Lots of photos contained therein, so click through.
“I never felt we weren’t going to win this game, even going into the last seconds,” Collins said. “I thought we made some really big errors. I think some errors that we had been making early in the season resurfaced as the pressure (increased). I think at times we succumbed to that and really didn’t play our style, but hats off to them. It takes a good team to take advantage of those things.”
“In the second quarter, we just got shell-shocked,” said Pioneer coachJames Corey. “We just sort of got overwhelmed for where we were and I think that second quarter really hurt.”
“I told them the most important thing was we had to play our game and I didn’t think we were doing that; we weren’t executing like we should,” said Ambrose.
Taylor Zdanowski, whose second-quarter goal gave Pioneer its only lead of the game, said despite the loss, he’s proud of what this group was able to accomplish.
“It means a lot to go 21-0 until the state championship game,” Zdanowski said. “That’s something I’ll remember forever.”
Kathy Quigley scored two goals 21 seconds apart in the last 1:30 of overtime to rally Birmingham United to a 12-11 victory over Hartland in the Division 1 girls lacrosse final at Rockford on Saturday.
United (18-11) held an 8-7 lead late in regulation when Rachel Sharpe fired in her only goal of the game with 51 seconds left to send the game to overtime tied at 8. It was Sharpe’s 35th goal of the season and it forced a 6-minute overtime.
The win completes the Pioneers’ season at 28-0, but even more impressive than the unbeaten season is how East Grand Rapids won. Just two teams came within three goals of the team, including a pair of 11-9 wins over Grand Rapids Catholic Central and a 6-3 win over Cranbrook-Kingswood. East Grand Rapids outscored five tournament opponents 67-24.
At Rockford, Claire Ludlow scored four goals, all in the first half, and Liza Elder scored three for East Grand Rapids (28-0), which at one point scored nine straight goals to stretch a 3-2 lead to 12-2. Olivia Sherman and Bailey Ellsworth each scored two for Okemos (16-6-1).
I’m 100% certain there are more articles out there. If you find one that I didn’t, feel free to link it in the comments.
Posted inhigh school|Comments Off on High School Season Wrap
Division 1 – Birmingham Unified
Division 2 – East Grand Rapids
Now the high school offseason begins, and it’s on to the summer club season (for which there should be a bit more coverage on GLS this year – stay tuned).
Michigan State lacrosse, off their best season in MCLA history, fired head coach Dwayne Hicks and assistant Chris Cooper last night. Though it outwardly appears to be an indication that the club is headed in the wrong direction, club president Seth Clickner, a junior defenseman from Albany, N.Y., explains that’s not the case.
“This was an entire team thing,” Clickner said. “Michigan State lacrosse is bigger than one person. I can’t say enough good things about them.”
However, with a talented roster coming back next year, the Spartans are looking to take the next step from perennial tournament participants to national title contenders. That includes a change at the top.
“They’re just not right for us,” Clickner said. “With our personnel, we can reach an even higher level with a new coach. It’s not about making it to nationals anymore, it’s about winning it.
“We’re committed to winning, and that’s all that matters.”
Clickner says the team’s reputation as a casual club, rather than an elite athletic outfit couldn’t be further from the truth. Although the Spartans have fun, they’re committed to doing whatever it takes on the field to win. Adding a top coach is the next piece of the puzzle in building a serious program.
MSU is confident in landing a high-level coach. Though a few candidates are in mind, last night’s tweets announcing the departures of Hicks and Cooper were made with the intent to draw any other potential applicants out of the woodwork. The club expects to compensate the coach with a reasonable monetary package, and is advertising their program as a stepping stone to an NCAA position for qualified candidates.
Another piece of bringing the Michigan State program to the next level is talking to someone who’s done it just down the road.
“I talked to JP [Michigan coach John Paul]. He did what every program wants to do. He built Michigan into a winner.”
Paul also took Michigan from the ranks of the MCLA to the Division-1 level, something that’s not on the horizon for the Spartans. However, with a new structure to the coach’s duties (such as no longer being responsible for travel arrangements, which a current player’s parent will do for the time being), MSU is looking to take the next step from being a club or team, into being a program.
According to a post on their team Twitter account last night (and several people getting in touch to fill me in), Michigan State’s MCLA team has fired head coach Dwayne Hicks and assistant Chris Cooper.
We have parted ways with head coach Dwayne Hicks and assistant coach Chris Cooper. We wish them the best of luck in future endeavors.
They are both class acts & helped us reach new program heights. We will continued to grow our program off the foundation they helped build.
I can’t help but think this is an awful decision for Michigan State. As mentioned, the program reached new heights under Hicks, and I have a very hard time they’ll continue to grow – at least without a couple big steps back – under new leadership, barring an unexpected blockbuster hire. My sources indicate that it was not a mutual parting of ways (as implied by the first tweet), but rather both being axed by the players, and unexpectedly at that.
And here is one of the problems with the MCLA. There are the teams that really want to succeed, and work to become top programs: the Michigans, Colorado States, and BYUs of the world. There are also teams that really want to just have a good time continuing their lacrosse careers as a casual club deal in college. Both are fine, but when coaches are caught in the crossfire, things can get pretty awkward.
All indications are that a lot of the Michigan State players would prefer to be a team that posts things like this on their official Twitter account:
These ground ball battles are getting sloppier then a sorority girl on a Saturday night at ricks.
…than one that’s willing to do what Coach Hicks asked of them to contend for national championships. At the end of the day, that’s their right – it’s a club league, after all – but results don’t come without hard work.
The coaching hire for the Spartans will play a huge role in determining the future of their program, and (to a lesser extent now that Davenport is moving up), of MCLA-1 in the state.
Rounding up the latest in the lacrosse world of Michigan. To drop me an article, news tip, etc., you can hit the inbox via twitter or email.
The Next Next Level
The Hopkins senior class was in attendance for Cote (in uniform).
Brother Rice alum Andrew Cote may have been limited in his playing time for Johns Hopkins this spring, but he has much more important adventures ahead. The entire Blue Jays senior class came out to see Cote commissioned into the U.S. Marine Corps last week. Thanks to GLS regular Reg Hartner for sending along the photo.
NCAA
Athletic Business talks about a potential explosion in the growth of Division-1 lacrosse, citing Michigan’s entry as the most recent piece of evidence (or even a catalyst) for more schools taking the plunge.
“At the big-time football level, adding lacrosse isn’t needed in terms of really changing the school’s profile that drastically,” says Michigan’s Paul. “At some of these schools that don’t have big-time football, adding lacrosse does change their profile… But when you have big-time football at this level, all of those things already exist a thousandfold from what you’re going to get from adding lacrosse. I think a lot of lacrosse people don’t necessarily understand that because they’re not around Big Ten, SEC, Pac-12 football that often.”
That said, no one expects another 30 years to pass before the next BCS school adds men’s lacrosse.
Who will be the next BCS conference team to add lacrosse? I’ve chimed in on possibilities before, and I’m anxious to see who will be next to take that big step. Thanks to Clark Bell for sending along the article.
Detroit led the nation in caused turnovers per game for the second year in a row, forcing 10.47 each time out. What that article doesn’t include is their performance on a tempo-free basis (as one of the fastest-playing teams in the nation, more possessions gives them more opportunities to create turnovers per game). A quick crunch of the Tempo-Free Lax numbers indicates that, even on a tempo-free basis, they were the country’s best team at causing turnovers – on nearly 30% of opposing possessions.
Dipping attendance for the NCAA Final Four (which hit a 10-year low of 79,595 for the semifinal and final rounds this year) has some pondering a change. While nothing is imminent, a site in the Midwest is possible down the road.
When asked about the possibility of moving championship weekend outside its traditional Northeast locations, Jarnecke said the answer might have been different a year ago. Bids for the 2014 NCAA Quarterfinals are due this summer, and the sites will be announced this fall. He said it’s unlikely a non-traditional area outside the Northeast would get a Final Four without first having a Quarterfinal. Next year one Quarterfinal site is in Indianapolis at Lucas Oil Stadium, the first time the NCAA has picked a site outside the Northeast for a Quarterfinal or Semifinal.
Expanding in this region of the country is obviously huge for programs like Michigan, Ohio State, and Marquette. It’s not worth going into extensive detail now, but I also contend that people who live in the Midwest are more likely to drive long distances to attend a college sporting event than are those on the East Coast, simply on account of the differences in geography between the two regions.
Michigan’s all-time leading scorer (with a grand total of 27 career points as a Division-1 player) Travor Yealy sits down with Lacrosse Magazineto talk about his career in aerospace engineering.
Calvin and Hope make the leap to Division-III this fall. The former MCLA-2 squads will be a part of the MIAA’s first lacrosse league. Current Midwest League members Adrian, Albion, and Trine, along with Independent Alma (a first-year program in 2012) will be the league’s other members.
MCLA
All games from the 2012 MCLA National Tournament are now available for streaming online (aside from a couple that were not filmed at all due to weather). That includes three Davenport games, four Grand Valley games, and two for Michigan State, so check them out if you’re interested.
Photos from Grand Valley’s title game loss to St. Thomas. Season in review from Davenport. Michigan State finished the year ranked 7th in MCLA-1.
Chris Gervat has been named the head lacrosse coach at Davenport University following the retirement of Bob Clarkston from the position.
Brother Rice 19, Clarkston 4. I was at this game, and Clarkston parents were heckling Brother Rice for running up the score. If the Warriors had wanted to, they would have scored 30, so knock off the complaining.
ADA – Forest Hills Central has been rampaging through the 2012 Division 2 boys lacrosse tournament like a predatory animal and scoring goals almost at will.
How predatory? Think sharks in a feeding frenzy. Or lions on a wildebeest. Or maybe even the “Man Vs. Food” dude devouring a double rack of ribs, with country fries, coleslaw and a malted milk shake thrown in for good measure.
Pioneer was apparently up big on L’Anse Creuse North at the time of the score, but I’m never one to criticize a goalie goal.
Brother Rice is still the lone Michigan representative in the ESPNHS Fab50 (and it will probably end that way), coming in at No. 42. In the Midwest, they’re behind only Culver Academy – against whom they split a pair of games this year – following Dublin (Ohio) Jerome’s first loss of the year in the state title game.
Recruiting
Are you interested in watching the CIF San Diego Section championship game to see Michigan signee Brendan Gaughan play? If so, more power to you. You can accomplish that life dream by clicking here. Of note – I only watched the first 25 minutes or so (brutal announcing is the best way to get me to change the channel if I’m not invested in the game), but he seems to play mostly midfield, not attack where he’s listed on the recruiting sites.
2013 Michigan commits Austin Shanks and Ian King will participate in the Warrior 40 this summer. 2012 signee Riley Kennedy participated in last summer’s event.
Special stuff. More at the link.
Etc.
The Heat Lacrosse club team has some interesting reversibles for this summer. The Grand Rapids native in me appreciates the Calder Grand Vitesse imagery on the shooting shirt (at left).
Look for a bit more coverage of the club scene this summer (hopefully with the help of a few knowledgeable folks).
This is mostly off-topic, but pretty funny: Grantland tackles the recent Boston Globe story about lax bro culture.
As always, thanks for visiting GreatLaxstate.com. Follow on Twitter @GreatLaxState, and you can share news tips, websites, etc. through twitter or email at t.w.sullivan1@gmail.com.
We’re down to the state semifinals. Only 16 teams left means only 12 more games before a champion is crowned in each of the four high school divisions.
Boys Division 1
Brother Rice v. Birmingham Seaholm, 6 p.m. @ Detroit Catholic Central
Holt v. Ann Arbor Pioneer, 6 p.m. @ Howell
Boys Division 2
Detroit Country Day v. Cranbrook, 6 p.m. @ Grosse Pointe South
Forest Hills Central v. Pontiac Notre Dame Prep, 6 p.m. @ East Lansing
Girls Division 1
Birmingham Seaholm v. Rockford, 5 p.m. @ South Lyon
Hartland v. Ann Arbor Pioneer, 7 p.m. @ South Lyon
Girls Division 2
East Grand Rapids v. Bloomfield Hills Cranbrook-Kingswood, 5 p.m. @ Okemos
Okemos v. Livonia Ladywood, 7 p.m. @ Okemos
