Editor’s Note: Thanks to the help of the innovative team at SISU Guard, the Official Mouthguard of the NLL, we’ve beefing up our National Lacrosse League coverage! We hope you enjoy our look at the 2016 NLL season through a new lens with the aid of our partner SISU!
Oh…my…goodness! We have four weeks left before the entire season wraps up and there are still FOUR playoff spots up for grabs. With all seeds in the Eastern Conference currently vacant, there isn’t a team left that couldn’t make the playoffs just by playing their cards right and receiving a little help from other teams losing. That means we are going to see some incredibly competitive lacrosse played down the stretch as everyone but Colorado and Saskatchewan are fighting for their lives.
Ryan Conwell will bring you up to speed on the last two games of the weekend, and I will get us all up to speed on the first two. Sit back, buckle up and keep your hands and feet inside the ride because things are about to takeoff!
Colorado Mammoth (6-5) @ NE Black Wolves (4-7)
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Quick Thoughts
- 12 min of penalty time between the teams
- The Wolves still haven’t clinched their postseason berth
- The second half was an incredible display of box lacrosse
With the win, Colorado has now already locked in their playoff berth, so now it’s about claiming, and holding onto, that #1 seed. It’s going to be hard for the Black Wolves to not make the postseason for the first time, but nothing is set in stone. About 3.5k lacrosse faithful made their way to Connecticut last weekend to cheer on their home squad against the top team in the Western Conference. Unfortunately, a career-high tying night by Callum Crawford would steal their thunder and ultimately the win.
Colorado Notes
What a return on investment the Mammoth are getting out of Callum Crawford! The big lefty put up 5 goals and 4 assists in the win, bringing him to #3 on the NLL points list with a total of 86. When New England tied the game in the early moments of the final frame, it was Crawford who punched in an unassisted bucket followed by a dagger on the powerplay to push the lead to two goals and keep it there. Sophomore star Eli McLaughlin came out swinging, putting up his best numbers to date. 3 goals and 1 assist should have earned him a star, but we all know that system is flawed. The offense was without fearless leader John Grant Jr. for the first time of the season. They were also without young gun Jeremy Noble, who started his 2 game suspension for a high-sticking penalty last weekend.
Uncharacteristically, Adam Jones had a quiet night, only finding the back of the net once for a single point. Cam Holding chipped in 2 goals of his own while recent addition Mike Mallory buried his first goal of the 2016 season. The scoring was fairly shallow, only 5 Mammoth picked up a goal over the weekend. Without Junior and Noble, it’s not a big surprise Adam Jones didn’t rack up the points as the main focus of the defense and with no one to feed him. This team is built for the postseason although they ran away with the regular campaign, winning double-digit games for the first time since 2012.
After coming in late against Calgary and capturing the W, Alex Buque got the call again last weekend on the road. He blocked 38 of the 48 ball thrown at him, kicking off with a 15 save first quarter. The win also kept Colorado as the only team in the NLL to be undefeated in their out-of-conference schedule. The Mammoth have already clinched, so now it’s about beating the Saskatchewan Rush to the #1 seed. They’ve got Vancouver, Georgia and Toronto on their schedule so they should be able to keep in cruise control until they go back to back with the Rush, which will likely decide who’s getting the bye.
New England Notes
With the loss, the Bandits were able to keep the Black Wolves at an arm’s length to hold on to the #1 seed and a bye in the first round of the postseason. With no guaranteed trips to the playoffs solidified yet for the teams in the Eastern Conference, no one has the luxury of slowing down now. Tied with the Bandits just a few short weeks ago, the Black Wolves have dropped to a game and a half behind and only 3 and a half above last place.
Captain Shawn Evans tried to strap up the backpack and carry his team, picking up 4 goals on the night while Kevin Buchanan matched his points with 1 goal and 3 assists. Kyle Buchanan and Kevin Crowley both struggled a bit with shooting, each only knocking down a goal each. After rejoining the lineup, defenseman Andrew Suitor knocked down his first goal of 2016, the final Black Wolf to score by netting their lone goal of the fourth quarter.
The game was tied heading into the final frame, but slow ball movement and constant pressure by the defense chipped away at everything they were building over the first 45 minutes. Goaltending continued to be a beacon of light for the defense, stopping 42 of 54 shots, pulling out all of the tricks but still ended up getting served the loss.
Buffalo Bandits (6-5) @ Georgia Swarm (4-7)
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Quick Thoughts
- Dhane Smith can’t be stopped
- Jay Thorimbert-less Buffalo struggles on the face-offs
- Georgia isn’t out of the playoffs yet!
Still without a guaranteed trip to the playoffs, Dhane Smith and his Buffalo Bandits went into the weekend with no room to roll over. The bright, young Georgia Swarm hosted the group from Western New York to make an attempt at keeping the door open for a postseason run. With the field season in full swing, less than four-thousand fans showed up in Gwinnett last weekend to help boost their Swarm toward life after the regular season.
Buffalo Notes
Still without a playoff berth, the Bandits had to make the best out of their game against the bottom rung teams. A runaway fourth quarter for the Bandits would end up stealing the show. Down a goal heading into the final period, Dhane Smith opened the flood gates racking up a hat trick in the quarter and along with 2 goals for each Ryan Benesch and Chad Culp,
Georgia Notes
The game got physical early on, packing out the penalty boxes for both teams with 9 penalties in the first quarter alone. Georgia was able to play it in their favor, netting a shorthanded goal and a powerplay score in the last two minutes of the quarter. After 40 minutes, the Swarm pulled goalie Brodie MacDonald for Zach Higgins. Higgins blew the lead in the fourth, calling for MacDonald to come back and finish the night. The L was assessed to Higgins after only stopping 5 of the 12 shots he faced.
The Swarm should be excited to see solid production from more of their forwards. Shayne Jackson led the scoring effort with 4 goals and 1 assists, 2 coming in the 13 goal fourth quarter, matched by team-leader Johnny Powless in points although his stats were the opposite, 1 goal and 4 assists. Lyle Thompson woke up a bit, knocking down 2 goals and 1 assist of his own, while brother Miles stayed sluggish with only a single score of his own. Rookie Randy Staats finished tied with Smith as the night’s points leader with 8 coming from 2 goals and 6 more assists. Fellow freshmen Jesse King and Chad Tutton both collected a goal of their own before the runaway fourth quarter.
I’m almost certain Jordan MacIntosh has bummed about the loss after the amount of work he put in on Saturday. He racked up 2 goals, 1 assist, 15 loose balls and finished 21 of 32 at the draw circle. MacIntosh has easily earned by nomination for the Transition Player of the Year, taking on, and owning, every role he can in the 13 games this season. Georgia
Calgary Roughnecks (5-7) @ Saskatchewan Rush (8-3)
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Quick Thoughts
- The Rush had a vicious extra man and transition game
- The Roughnecks are still not a playoff team
- The Rush defense is clicking
In a game that has been one of the better rivalries in the league lately, the end result was hardly a disappointment. The Rush built a strong lead at halftime and were able to smother any effort by Calgary to stage a comeback. The Rush did not clinch home field in the playoffs, but they did guarantee at least one more game in front of their fans.
Calgary Notes
Calgary on the other hand is still breathing, but could not seal a win to lock up that last playoff spot. I do like their odds as they close out the season a pair of games against Vancouver, and another against Toronto. A win in any of those three should be enough to have the Roughnecks locked into an extra game.
The Riggers offense was led by the typical names. Curtis Dickson was top on the team with three goals and three assists, followed by Jeff Shattler with a goal and four helpers, and Dane Dobbie being rather efficient with three goals on a total of nine shots (Dickson’s three took 24 shots by comparison). While this group did get the only three goals of the third quarter, managing just a single goal in the fourth was a big reason behind the loss. It was a one goal game until the final 30 seconds, but Calgary just could not solve the Rush defense in time, even with the extra attacker at the end.
The goalies combined for a respectable save percentage of 80%, but Calgary also did not contribute much in the way of transition. That may be a good thing as the Rush would love a track meet, but they also did better than most teams and kept the Rush a few goals under their season average. A weak point for the team was in faceoffs where they had no answer to Saskatchewan’s Jeremy Thompson, and won only seven of the 23 draws. They also were beat up in loose balls and only managed six caused turnovers in the game. Calgary he been much better in these categories in the past, and if they hope to advance to the division or cup finals, they will need to improve significantly in the tightness as a defense compared to their effort in this game.
Saskatchewan Notes
The Rush forwards perhaps were a little too reliant on the powerplay in this game. While their calling card is transition, the set offense only produced a pair of goals on the night that did not need odd numbers or help from the back-end. Mark Matthews led the team with a hat trick and three helpers while Robert Church was right behind him with two goals and three assists of his own. The extra man unit was able to convert to goals on five of their eight opportunities, which was noticeable higher than their season average of 44%
Their defense did a great job pushing the ball up the floor and was rewarded with keeper Aaron Bold getting a pair of assists, Chris Corbeil had the same while Brett Mydske, Kyle Rubisch, Adrian Sorichetti, and Jeff Cornwall all had a point each. While Bold is leading the league in goals against average, his save percentage is quite a bit lower on the table. On many teams, that may be more of a concern, but the defense does such a great job forcing opposing forwards to take terrible shot that wind up off goal, it becomes manageable. The heart of this team absolutely lies with their defensive pressure.
In terms of playoffs, the Rush are still alive in the effort to host as many playoff games as possible. They are tied with Colorado in that fight, which will get interesting in a week when the two teams have a weekend series. Outside of those two games, the Rush travel to New England next and end with Toronto and Rochester. That is by no means an easy slate of games, so winning the rights to more home games will be earned.
Toronto Rock (4-9) @ Vancouver Stealth (3-10)
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Quick Thoughts
- Vancouver is STILL ALIVE in the playoff race
- The win keeps Toronto alive for another week
- Fighting does not always help your team
While this game could have easily been billed as a race to the bottom, both of these teams are still alive in the playoff hunt, despite their increasingly large mountain to climb. With so much on the line, these desperate teams resorted to desperate measures in a brutal fourth quarter. It seems like every few minutes saw another players (usually for the Rock) laying on the floor after a hit or altercation. Vancouver’s Jeff Moleski tried to keep the crowd interested with a fight when only 16 seconds remained on the scoreboard, but the contest was pretty sealed at that point.
Vancouver Notes
The Stealth were of course led in scoring by none other than Rhys Duch, whose 7 points brought him up to seventh in the league in total points. Joel McCready also chipped in a hat trick but his mark on the game was a little more negative that than. In the fourth quarter, he had the penalty minutes piled on him for starting a fight. Penalty minutes happen, but these lead to a pair of Toronto Power Play goals which would prove to be the difference in the game. Providing a spark for your team or defending your teammates is one thing, but doing so against the #2 Power Play in the league is another.
Defensively, the Stealth did not have a great performance and gave Toronto way too many prime shots through the game. The Rock scored pretty consistently through the game, and Tyler Richards recorded a save on just 75% of the shots in his direction, but he did outperform Toronto’s Nick Rose.. The Stealth did do a good job of using their transition game, nothing several point from the defensive ranks. They played at a deficit way too often though, as Toronto scored five of their 13 goals on the Power Play. Those five goals on what was really six true opportunities could have been the difference in the game.
From here, the Stealth need to win, and win a ton. They have a pair of games against Calgary, who sits between them and a trip to the playoffs. Two wins there helps, but they still need to run the table on the Rush, Mammoth, and Swarm while still hoping Calgary does not win their final game against Toronto. Possible? Yes. Probable? Well, are you feeling lucky, chump?
Toronto Notes
Like I mentioned with the Stealth, Toronto’s key was there highly efficient Power Play unit. Only counting the six Vancouver penalties that results in man-up situations for Toronto, the Rock were 5/6. They really spread the ball around well in the situations, too. Rob Hellyer had the game high of nine points (4,5), while Stephan Leblanc was not far behind with six of his own. Rookies Dan Lintner and Turner Evans both chipped in a few points, two and four, respectively. The Rock will need to work on their standard offensive sets to make a playoff run, but they did what was needed in this one.
Defense for the Rock left much to be desired. 11 goals in this league is not much to be too upset about, but the Stealth shot on Nick Rose very well. They scored a few transition points, including a shorthanded goal from Brodie Merrill to go with his assist. They only gave up a pair of powerplay goals out of four opportunities and let in an extra attacker goal. So as far as even-man situations go, only 8 goals is not too bad. They will need to do much better though as they have a bumpy road for the postseason. There is little room for error.
Toronto still has some decent playoff hopes as not a single Eastern team has clinched yet. I don’t think you will see them hosting a playoff game, but with several wins and a little bit of help, they can get in. They face New England next, followed by a double-header weekend with Buffalo, so it won’t be easy. They close out the season with home games against the Mammoth and Calgary. It’s a tough slate, but they do not need to be perfect if the Knighthawks and Swarm start dropping some games at the same time. Their scenarios are to win out and have Rochester lose three games and Georgia two, win four while Georgia loses three and Rochester four, or win just three while Rochester loses the rest of their games and Georgia’s sole win is against Rochester. There is still life for the Rock.
