On St. Patrick’s Day weekend, the luck of the Irish prevailed.
This came at the expense of the No. 18 Michigan men’s lacrosse team, who were soundly defeated by No. 2 Notre Dame as their recent decline in fortunes continues. The Wolverines (5-3 overall) lost 19-9 to the Fighting Irish (5-1), due largely in part to a second and third period defensive implosion.
“When you play a team like Notre Dame, who I believe is the best team in the country, you have to be perfect,” Michigan coach Kevin Conry said. “And when you’re not perfect, they take advantage.
The Wolverines weren’t perfect on Saturday. And they weren’t particularly close, either.
The underlying statistics suggested an even game between the teams. Notre Dame took 42 shots to Michigan’s 41, won 17 faceoffs to the Wolverines’ 15 and turned the ball over 15 times to Michigan’s 18. But the difference was that the Irish’s best players stepped up massively on both ends when it counted.
Notre Dame goalkeeper Liam Entenmann saved 14 shots for a percentage of .609. This was significantly better than the Wolverines’ sophomore goalkeeper Hunter Taylor, who saved just seven for a .292 percentage. Attackers Chris Kavanagh and Pat Kavanagh registered six and four assists respectively, playing a key role in facilitating attacks.
But the biggest difference maker for Notre Dame was attacker Jake Taylor, who bagged a whopping seven goals on just nine shots. While Michigan graduate attacker Justin Tiernan returned to his best form, with a four-goal game, the fact that they matched Taylor’s shot count while producing three goals fewer indicated the Wolverines’ lack of efficiency.
“We had several doorsteps where we couldn’t finish,” Conry said. “Both teams had a lot of shots on the doorsteps. They just took advantage of those.”
But in spite of all of this, there were points in the match where Michigan was competitive. The Wolverines and Irish were tied 3-3 in the first period, and Michigan outscored Notre Dame 4-2 in the fourth. But in between, the Wolverines lost any chance at victory.
In the second and third periods, the Irish outscored Michigan 14-2, precipitated by their dominance across several statistical categories. Most notable was Notre Dame’s superiority across ground ball pickups, with 24 to the Wolverines’ 15, shots on goal — with 19 to Michigan’s 12 — and saves, with 10 to the Wolverines’ 5. Michigan’s failure to capitalize on ground balls, missing opportunities to dictate the flow of play, underlined the sloppiness and inefficiency which haunted the Wolverines all afternoon.
“I just thought it was second chance opportunities,” Conry said. “Even when we put the ball on the ground, Notre Dame scooped them up, or when we had clear enough attendees, we just didn’t.”
It was a day to forget for Michigan. The loss was their only performance of the year where they failed to score double figures, and marked their second consecutive loss. It also continues a troubling downturn in performance that has been evident over the course of the past few weeks. Their inefficiency and sloppiness meant that the day before St. Patrick’s Day, the Irish claimed the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.