Why the JHU win was so big but why Syracuse has a lot more work to do | Syracusefan.com

Why the JHU win was so big but why Syracuse has a lot more work to do

JeremyCuse

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First off, HUGE win Saturday. In back to back must win games Syracuse has come up big despite gettign embarrased again at the X. The win now pushes SU to 4-2 on the season and gives them a whole week of practice time (next game is Sunday) on a full field for Duke. In the bigger picture the win was huge for multiple reasons. It Syracuse a win over a previously undefeated team on the road. Even though JHU has its own gauntlet of game coming up this win assures Syracuse a top 20 win and gives them much needed breathing room.

That being said we still have a long way to go. The X play was as bad as we had feared and looking ahead it doesnt get much easier at all. We all know about Fowler and Duke so no need to rehash that nightmare, after that ND's faceoff guy trounced UVA yesterday and while UNC is missing there top guy, there frosh replacement actually outdid Fowler on Sat (I know great news). Cornell also remains undefeated after beating Yale. With our record at 4-2 we need three more win to lock in .500 which with our SOS would almost guarantee a tourney invite. I know based on our #1 pre-season ranking we were all hoping for better then just getting in but with the faceoff issues what they are and our schedule its going to be tough. We still have Colgate, Hobart and Bingo on the schedule. That should be 3 wins but I caution to put all as a lock, Colgate is 6-1 and Bingo has a good guy at the X and for Hobart the syracuse game is there superbowl world series nba finals all rolled into one. If Syracuse can hold serve there and go 1-1 over the next two games we would be looking at 8 wins and thats not counting games against Cornell and UNC.

So where do we go from here? To me the two biggest issues remain clearing (still a total adventure) and obviously the X (an absolute nightmare). Not sure if Woody or someone else connected can comment on Paduda's health but I cant imagine for the life of me why in the world he hasn't gotten a turn unless hes still injured. Ditto for Demarco, I know hes a true frosh and only 5'4 but he had .910 win % last year in highschool and is an all-american, how could he possibly do worse? I do want to defend Daddio for a second as bad as he has been he is getting absolutely ZERO help from the wings. Daddio was able to scrum it up a few time but our wing guys are either as slow as me or have zero idea how to play the wings on a faceoff because they ARE NEVER NEAR THE BALL EVER. McCartney needs to get off the wing, hes a great D player but man whenever hes out there hes never close to the ball, I cant remember the last time he grabbed a GB on a faceoff. Ditto for the short stick guys we keep running out there. On one draw I saw Saturday the ball finally got hit back and our wing player was nearly at the box line, where the hell was he going?

Give me two guys who play without abandon our there, my votes are for Firman and Lecky, those two fly around like there shorts are on fire, let them battle, Lecky has been grabbing GB's this year like I have never seen before, let he and Firman give it a shot. I know Desko will trot Daddio out there Sunday but I really wish we woudl give someone else a shot, Fowler is already in Daddio's head and its going to be a bloodbath, really hope we burn Demarco's shirt and role with him.
 
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i'd have to believe daddio is the best guy in practice and thats why nobody is getting a turn.

at this point i'd put my best pole groundballer and my best short stick groundballer on the wings. daddio's simple instruction would be to a) keep the ball in front preventing draw fast breaks and b) just create a scrum; you have a better chance of winning the groundball battle.
 
the clearing issues are ridicilous. guys are open and we're not making passes, i don't know why. case in point was our offsides, when Lamo was caught at midfield. Friggin billy ward - who wasn't sure which side of the field he should be on - was open anyways. lamo er'd by just not dumping the ball off to him. i saw this several - mids running open (even if it's 2 steps) just dump the dam ball off to them.
 
the clearing issues are ridicilous. guys are open and we're not making passes, i don't know why. case in point was our offsides, when Lamo was caught at midfield. Friggin billy ward - who wasn't sure which side of the field he should be on - was open anyways. lamo er'd by just not dumping the ball off to him. i saw this several - mids running open (even if it's 2 steps) just dump the dam ball off to them.

We need to go back to the traditional clearing way ala Matt Abbott and Kevin Drew and have them get the ball in our end and clear it themselves. Jenkins did this 2-3 times Saturday and cleared it easily. We run into issues when we try to pass over the Mid line to our mids who are getting covered and then when they do get open, Lamo or the long pole hesitates causing a failure to advance or an offsides. The coaching staff also needs to do a better job of letting our guys know where we are in regards to the 30 second clock. Twice we actually cleared in time Saturday but instead of gettign it in the box we danced around it and got called for a failure to advance.
 
It baffles me why Daddio isn't using a jam move to at least defend against the pinch/pop/plunger move that he is getting beat on constantly. His footwork isn't at the level of the guys that are beating him and that isn't something you're going to learn once the season starts. If we could win most of the FO's where he wins the draw our numbers would be much better but he isn't he isn't getting those groundballs himself (again footwork) and the wings as has been discussed are not getting the job done.
 
Given how desperate the face-off situation is, I would like to see our best takeaway artist (Firman?) moved into the Face-off X. He may lose the draw initially but with his takeaway skills he may get the ball anyway. BTW the Duke game is pretty big, if we lose we would be in solo possession of last place in the ACC (0-3) with little hope of competing in the "winner's bracket" (must finish in the top 4) of the ACC tournament.
 

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