Powellfan
Renowned lacrosse analyst
- Joined
- Jul 16, 2014
- Messages
- 5,735
- Like
- 9,224
The Syracuse Orange face-off against the Georgetown Hoyas in the first round of the NCAA Tournament. The Orange may have drawn a favorable matchup, but by no means an easy one. Georgetown has a strong offense, an at times suffocating defense and are strong in the specialty departments. That said, they aren't perfect, and, given other matchups it is certainly a game this talented, but flawed SU team could win. Let's get to it.
The Hoyas have one of the best offensive players in the country in Jake Carraway. He leads the team in points with 62 and goals with 46. He is joined on attack by a great passing freshman in TJ Haley (5 goals and an absurd 47 assists) and Dylan Watson who has 19 and 5 but has only played 7 of Georgetown's 14 games this year. They also have a strong midfield led by Graham Bundy Jr, third on the team with 34,12, Colgate transfer Nicky Petkevich who has 17, 20 and Declan McDermott with 18 and 9. They are supplemented by freshman Dylan Hess who scored the winning goal against Denver in the Big East Tournament with 13 and seven. That gives Georgetown seven players with at least 20 points. They aren't deep past that, but that matches up well with Syracuse, now that Chase Scanlan is off the team. I imagine Mitch Wykoff will draw the Carraway matchup, but the Haley matchup is the real x-factor. I'd like to see Grant Murphy on the frosh, given that I think his on-ball skills are pretty good, and it would hopefully take him out of the sliding game as I think Murphy is not very good in that department. Size wise they matchup well as Haley is 6'2. That leaves Cole Horan on the Canadian Watson.
Have to hope that Brendan Aviles comes back as the short sticks have really struggled recently. I don't know how likely that is unfortunately given that he's been out for a while. Just have to hope for the best here, but Brett Kennedy really needs to have a good game, both on-ball and in between the lines. He's been a bright spot for the defense and he'll need to keep it up. It was good to see Dami back for the Robert Morris game, have to wonder how much run he and Dearth will be given. I've talked endlessly about how bad the defense has been recently and it's hard to see how they turn it around for this game. Porter will simply have to make a lot of saves and they cannot allow Georgetown to go on a long scoring run. I don't know how much zone we will see but I don't think it would be a good match against the Hoyas as they seem like a good passing team.
One weak spot for the Georgetown offense is they have been turnover prone these last few games, 15 against Denver, 20 against Villanova and 18 in a loss to Loyola. Cuse will have to find the right balance of pressuring the Hoyas and also playing solid defense. Possessions might be hard to come by as the Hoyas are led by James Reilly and his 59% win percentage. In his last three games he's gone 8-23, 17-29 and 12-24. Jakob Phaup has been all over the place this year so its hard to know what to expect. Desko really has stuck with the Junior recently, so if he does struggle it will be interesting to see how quickly he goes to Danny Varello. Syracuse of course has to be decent here as I don't think our defense can withstand the Hoyas offense over multiple possessions.
Georgetown's defense started the year like gangbusters this year, giving up an unbelievable two goals in two games, one of those games against Villanova, a tournament bubble team. Since then they've come down to earth, but still have some very good players led by Gibson Smith and goalie Owen McElory. The goalie is especially impressive and seems to be playing well recently. He has a 60% save percentage and only gives up 8 goals a game. It looks like the last "bad" game he had was all the way back on March 20th when he gave up 9 goals and only made 5 saves against Providence (G-town still won 14-9). The next time he played the Friars he made 24 saves and only gave up only 4 goals. Yikes. The Hoyas do look like a very slide heavy team, which I think favors the Orange as they are best when moving the ball and trying to find the open man. I think SU really struggles when teams don't slide and forces the team to be more individualistic. The Orange of course will have to be methodical and can't turn the ball over carelessly, and they need to take good shots. Hopefully we see a heavy dose of Owen Hiltz and his sublime shooting.
On paper Georgetown looks like a very strong team - but like most teams this year they are hard to judge since they played a conference heavy schedule. Yes they do have two wins against a strong Denver team, but those Pioneers have their own issues. And the one time they played a tough out of conference opponent (Loyola), they lost. Syracuse will be a big test for the Hoyas and if the Orange can get some early confidence then I think they have a real shot at winning this game. Face-offs are a real worry though and the defense needs to have a real turnaround. Syracuse has the talent but they need to put it all together and have a complete team performance to advance.
The Hoyas have one of the best offensive players in the country in Jake Carraway. He leads the team in points with 62 and goals with 46. He is joined on attack by a great passing freshman in TJ Haley (5 goals and an absurd 47 assists) and Dylan Watson who has 19 and 5 but has only played 7 of Georgetown's 14 games this year. They also have a strong midfield led by Graham Bundy Jr, third on the team with 34,12, Colgate transfer Nicky Petkevich who has 17, 20 and Declan McDermott with 18 and 9. They are supplemented by freshman Dylan Hess who scored the winning goal against Denver in the Big East Tournament with 13 and seven. That gives Georgetown seven players with at least 20 points. They aren't deep past that, but that matches up well with Syracuse, now that Chase Scanlan is off the team. I imagine Mitch Wykoff will draw the Carraway matchup, but the Haley matchup is the real x-factor. I'd like to see Grant Murphy on the frosh, given that I think his on-ball skills are pretty good, and it would hopefully take him out of the sliding game as I think Murphy is not very good in that department. Size wise they matchup well as Haley is 6'2. That leaves Cole Horan on the Canadian Watson.
Have to hope that Brendan Aviles comes back as the short sticks have really struggled recently. I don't know how likely that is unfortunately given that he's been out for a while. Just have to hope for the best here, but Brett Kennedy really needs to have a good game, both on-ball and in between the lines. He's been a bright spot for the defense and he'll need to keep it up. It was good to see Dami back for the Robert Morris game, have to wonder how much run he and Dearth will be given. I've talked endlessly about how bad the defense has been recently and it's hard to see how they turn it around for this game. Porter will simply have to make a lot of saves and they cannot allow Georgetown to go on a long scoring run. I don't know how much zone we will see but I don't think it would be a good match against the Hoyas as they seem like a good passing team.
One weak spot for the Georgetown offense is they have been turnover prone these last few games, 15 against Denver, 20 against Villanova and 18 in a loss to Loyola. Cuse will have to find the right balance of pressuring the Hoyas and also playing solid defense. Possessions might be hard to come by as the Hoyas are led by James Reilly and his 59% win percentage. In his last three games he's gone 8-23, 17-29 and 12-24. Jakob Phaup has been all over the place this year so its hard to know what to expect. Desko really has stuck with the Junior recently, so if he does struggle it will be interesting to see how quickly he goes to Danny Varello. Syracuse of course has to be decent here as I don't think our defense can withstand the Hoyas offense over multiple possessions.
Georgetown's defense started the year like gangbusters this year, giving up an unbelievable two goals in two games, one of those games against Villanova, a tournament bubble team. Since then they've come down to earth, but still have some very good players led by Gibson Smith and goalie Owen McElory. The goalie is especially impressive and seems to be playing well recently. He has a 60% save percentage and only gives up 8 goals a game. It looks like the last "bad" game he had was all the way back on March 20th when he gave up 9 goals and only made 5 saves against Providence (G-town still won 14-9). The next time he played the Friars he made 24 saves and only gave up only 4 goals. Yikes. The Hoyas do look like a very slide heavy team, which I think favors the Orange as they are best when moving the ball and trying to find the open man. I think SU really struggles when teams don't slide and forces the team to be more individualistic. The Orange of course will have to be methodical and can't turn the ball over carelessly, and they need to take good shots. Hopefully we see a heavy dose of Owen Hiltz and his sublime shooting.
On paper Georgetown looks like a very strong team - but like most teams this year they are hard to judge since they played a conference heavy schedule. Yes they do have two wins against a strong Denver team, but those Pioneers have their own issues. And the one time they played a tough out of conference opponent (Loyola), they lost. Syracuse will be a big test for the Hoyas and if the Orange can get some early confidence then I think they have a real shot at winning this game. Face-offs are a real worry though and the defense needs to have a real turnaround. Syracuse has the talent but they need to put it all together and have a complete team performance to advance.
