By Justin Paley
The intricacies of lacrosse produce the difference between wins and losses. For the Pride men’s lacrosse team; however, losses can be pinpointed to one thing: face-offs.
For the fourth time this season the Pride lost that battle, and No. 1 Johns Hopkins was not the team to falter against. The Blue Jays jumped on the No. 11 Pride, 13-6, before 4,208 fans at Shuart Stadium.
John Hopkins dominated from the outset, exploiting the Pride’s inexperience building up a 5-0 lead with 5:23 left in the first quarter. During the run, Kyle Barrie had three of his team-high four goals for the Blue Jays.
Pride sophomore goalie Matt Southard talked about how Johns Hopkins was able to score so often. “They play a great team offense. They moved the ball real well and quick,” Southard said.
The Pride (2-2) got a break when Joe McDermott was called for a holding penalty giving the Pride a 30 second extra man opportunity. The Pride converted as sophomore middie Tim Treubig found junior middie Ryan Vilar for one of three goals Vilar scored on the afternoon.
Johns Hopkins answered back less than a minute later as Jake Byrne scored an unassisted goal to give his team a 6-1 lead after the first quarter.
In the second quarter, the Pride got rid of the pre-game jitters and realized it could hang with the Blue Jays as it slowed the game down. “Once we knew we could play with these guys, we were more confident,” Southard said. Pride head coach John Danowski agreed with his goalie.
“We have a young team and you’re never quite sure how they are going to respond. Being down 6-1 is tough to any team,” Danowski said. “I really like that we did hang in there, play hard and I saw a lot of nice things we could build on in the next couple of weeks. The guys stuck to the game plan defensively.”
Sophomore middie John Orsen scored on a Vilar assist 5:16 into the second quarter. Then Vilar dished to Treubig five minutes later to bring the Pride within three goals at 6-3.
Vilar continued his solid performance by scoring with 3:07 left before halftime. Vilar is second on the team with nine goals and tied for the team-lead with six assists on the year.
Greg Peyser found Conor Ford for a goal with 3:01 left in the second quarter to give Johns Hopkins a 7-4 lead.
Blue Jays head coach Dave Pietramala made a change in net as he replaced Scott Smith with Jesse Schwartzman three minutes before halftime. The switch worked as the Pride scored only twice more the rest of the game.
The Pride went into the locker room feeling good only down by three goals at 7-4.
Johns Hopkins extended its lead to 8-4 a little over one minute into the second half when Kevin Boland put a shot past Matt Southard. Despite allowing 13 goals, Southard kept his team in the game by making 19 saves.
Vilar again scored for the Pride with 10 minutes left in the third quarter to bring the Pride back within three at 8-5. It seemed like Vilar might again be the hero after scoring the game winner that gave the Pride a 9-8 win over Loyola College on March 6.
However, it was the last Pride goal until 8:41 left in the fourth quarter as Hopkins went on its second 5-0 run of the game to take a commanding 13-5 lead with 11:15 left in the game.
“When you’re on defense for so long, it’s tough to get rhythm on offense. They had the ball for a long time and I felt like that hurt us,” Vilar said.
During the Blue Jays run, Duke transfer and Bethpage High School graduate Matt Rewkowski scored two goals. It was a homecoming for Rewkowski who graduated from Bethpage High School and transferred from Duke this past year. He is one of 11 Long Island natives on Hopkins.
Another Long Island product, Greg Peyser from Cold Spring Harbor High School was dominant in the face-off circle, winning 15 of 15. Peyser had many friends and family in the stands. “It was starred on my schedule at home. You want to play good for your home crowd,” Peyser said.
Johns Hopkins head coach Dave Pietramala talked about how face-offs are so key. “When you have the possession of the ball, you don’t have to play a lot of defense,” Pietramala said.
Danowski gave credit to the Blue Jays. “There a terrific face-off team. That’s not the strength of our team.”
The Blue Jays dominated the stat sheet, out-shooting the Pride, 52-24 and winning groundballs, 43-27.
One of the big questions coming into the season was the lack of team chemistry. Danowski feels it has improved over the first four games. “We’re learning to play together. I’d like to think we’ll see chemistry evolve,” Danowski said.
The Pride now goes on the road for four straight games beginning Saturday at Princeton for a 1:30 p.m. contest. Princeton was tied for No. 6 in this week’s USILA/STX Coaches Poll while the Pride fell three spots to No. 14. Danowski feels it will be a good experience for his young team.
“I think it’s a positive to be on the bus together, in a hotel and spend time together. Two of the trips are day trips to Princeton and Stony Brook so it’s really not too frightening. I hope we’ll hang in there and get better. I told them after today’s game this will only make us better because they won’t play too many teams better than Johns Hopkins,” Danowski said.
If the Pride wants to be successful the rest of the season, it will have to start winning the battle of the face-offs.