Perhaps the hidden beauty of No. 1 seed Notre Dame’s 13-6 NCAA Men’s Lacrosse Tourney semifinal conquest of 5 seed Denver Saturday was how improbable the moment felt back in the fall to Irish coach Kevin Corrigan.
And how the defending national champion Irish (15-1) looked then very little like the group that dominated in every phase Saturday at Lincoln Financial Field in Philadelphia, especially with their depth in the second half, to reach the title game for the second year in a row.
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“I talked to a lot of coaches this year and said, ‘What do I do? How do I avoid the kind of letdown of what happens after you win a championship?’” Corrigan related after Notre Dame used a 8-2 dominance in the second half to lock down a title game spot (1 p.m. EDT; ESPN) back at Lincoln Financial Field against 7 seed Maryland (11-5).
“And the short answer that every single one of them gave me is, ‘You don’t. You can’t. It’s human nature. You’re not going to outrun that one or outsmart that one. You’ve just got to go through it.’
“So that’s what we talked to our guys about. We’ve got to go through it. And we had a terrible fall — terrible in terms of results. Not terrible in terms of the amount of work we got done. I think that’s helping us now. But terrible in terms of our performance. We just got our butts kicked.
“So, we went through that, and we just kept saying to them, ‘All right. This is the journey for this team. We don’t have to have the journey of last year’s team. Let’s keep our eye on the ball and keep working. And, hopefully, we can make it back to this weekend and have a chance to win again.’”
Junior Will Lynch was one of many reasons why, winning 18 of 23 faceoffs Saturday to help the Irish play keep-away from the Pioneers (13-4).
“The way we look at the faceoff matchup is more of a 3 v. 3,” said the nation’s No. 2 player in faceoff win percentage this season. “It doesn’t happen without all three people being on the same page.”
The Notre Dame faceoff advantage was 6-0 in the fourth quarter, against a team that was collectively fifth nationally in that category coming in, as the Irish pulled away after leading just 5-4 at halftime.
“Obviously, the faceoff advantage in the second half became huge, because then you’re playing make-it, take-it, when you get a couple of goals and you get the ball back,” said Corrigan, who picked up win No. 350 of his Notre Dame tenure. “It’s really hard. It’s like you’re playing uphill lacrosse when the other team starts with a possession every time. The only way you can get a possession is by stopping them. It puts a lot of pressure on everybody.”
Grad senior Liam Entenmann, named this week as the Kelly Award winner for the second year in a row, put the pressure on the Denver offense by making 12 saves. And the Irish defense, led by first-team All-American Ben Ramsey and second-teamer and freshman Shawn Lyght, held Denver leading scorer JJ Sillstrop without a goal or an assist and to just two shot attempts.
And then there were the Kavanagh brothers, grad senior Pat and junior Chris.
Each of them had three goals, as did Brown grad transfer Devon McLane. Pat added two assists and Chris one. Jake Taylor, Nick Harris, Eric Dobson and football moonlighter Jordan Faison all had a goal apiece.
“Come May, it doesn’t really matter who scores,” Chris Kavanagh said. “It’s about getting a W at the end of the day.”
Denver’s 6-foot-5 attack man Richie Connell scored the first goal of the game and the last one before halftime, with eight seconds left in the second quarter, as the Pioneers closed to within a goal, at 5-4.
A crowd of 32,269 looked in as Pioneers goalie Malcolm Kleban had nine saves in the first half, but just one in the second. The Irish put the game away about a third of the way through the final period with a flurry of three goals in a 61-second span against the nation’s No. 2 team in scoring defense. McLane had two of those.
“As great as our defense plays — in moments today they were fantastic, just as they’ve been all year long,” an emotional first-year Denver head coach Matt Brown said. “But as great as you are as a defensive unit, if [the opponent] has the ball that long in that many stretches, things will get a little sloppy from time to time.
“I’m proud of these guys. They got our program back to where we belong. … I felt we probably needed to have a perfect game today. That, we did not."
And Notre Dame was close to it after halftime.
The Irish started their current 13-game win streak March 3 with a 14-9 win at home against Maryland, which beat 6 seed Virginia, 12-6, in Saturday's second semifinal.
“I consider myself unbelievably fortunate to coach the kids that we have,” Corrigan said. “They’re great, great kids. Their character is off the charts. We're going to play for the national championship on Monday. But we also had the highest GPA of any men’s team on campus this spring. We also just got an award from the Boys & Girls Club that we are the volunteer of the year in greater St. Joe County.
“So we’re got great kids, great people to be around. I consider myself blessed. And then on top of that, you’ve got guys that are competitors on the level that they are.”
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