Blue Jays on the flip side vs. Rutgers
After upset of Penn State, Johns Hopkins stumbles and falls
The Rutgers men’s lacrosse team took a page out of Johns Hopkins’ playbook.
A week after winning faceoffs, maintaining long possessions and turning those opportunities into goals in a seven-goal upset of then-No. 12 Penn State, the No. 15 Blue Jays got a taste of their own medicine in a 15-9 setback Saturday afternoon to the No. 6 Scarlet Knights in a Big Ten tilt before an announced crowd of 186 at Homewood Field in Baltimore.
In that 13-6 win against the Nittany Lions on March 13, Johns Hopkins went on a 9-1 run over the second and third quarters, including a 7-0 spurt in the third, to suggest the team had struck the right notes.
On Saturday, however, the Blue Jays (2-3, 2-3 Big Ten) were overwhelmed by Rutgers (4-1), which had a 10-2 burst in the second half, including a 7-1 fourth quarter.
Johns Hopkins coach Peter Milliman did not mince words about his team’s performance.
“I think right now, we’ve been doing things long enough to know what they are, but when we see some struggle and push comes to shove, we kind of revert to poor habits and we fall a little bit out of what we’re fundamentally supposed to be doing,” he said. “I think as soon as we start
needing a goal, I think guys were chasing a little bit too much and it took us away from the type of lacrosse that we think can be successful.”
Armed with a 7-5 lead at halftime, the Blue Jays offense put on a disappearing act, going 14 minutes, 43 seconds without a goal. The Scarlet Knights took advantage with a pair of goals from redshirt senior attackman Kieran Mullins and then matched junior midfielder Garrett Degnon’s goal with 1:41 left with sophomore faceoff specialist Jonathan Dugenio’s tally 19 seconds later to knot the score at 8-all heading into the fourth quarter.
Rutgers flipped the switch in the final period thanks to gains on faceoffs and in transition. Dugenio won the faceoff to begin the frame and fed graduate student midfielder Connor Kirst for a goal just six seconds in.
Fifty-eight seconds later, Johns Hopkins graduate student goalkeeper Josh Kirson corralled a loose ball outside of the crease, but graduate student attackman Adam Charalambides batted Kirson’s stick, and the ball flew out of his stick and into the empty net behind him for a 10-8 lead.
After junior midfielder Evan Zinn scored a goal to halve the deficit with 13 minutes remaining, the Scarlet Knights went on a 4-0 run over a 4:38 span. Blue Jays senior defenseman Jared Reinson dropped an
outlet pass in the middle of the field, and freshman midfielder Shane Knoblauch found Mullins for an unsettled goal with 11:32 left.
Dugenio won the ensuing faceoff and passed the ball to Charalambides, who passed the ball to Mullins for his second goal in eight seconds. After Mullins returned the favor by threading a pass to Charalambides on the doorstep with 8:54 remaining, Mullins slung the ball to Kirst for a rocket from the right point for a 14-9 advantage with 6:54 left.
Mullins, who led all scorers with game highs in both goals (five) and points (eight), said the offense discovered its rhythm in the second half.
“I think at first, we were kind of unsteady a little bit, and then we kind of kept going,” he said. “I think a big part of it was getting long possessions and making sure that we’re not one-hit wonders on offense.
“In the first half offensively, we didn’t play very well. We just passed the ball, and one guy went and didn’t draw two. Then toward the end we started multiple dodges and multiple opportunities, and I think that’s what sparked us a little bit.”
Charalambides added five points on three goals and two assists, and Kirst had four points on three goals and one assist. And although Dugenio won only 8 of 19 faceoffs, he finished with one goal, one assist, five ground balls and two caused turnovers.
“Jon’s talented and not only facing off, but he’s good at ground balls, and he’s got
a great stick,” Rutgers coach Brian Brecht said. “He can run in transition. He had a goal and an assist today, so he’s someone that we can leave on the field with our Rope unit and our guys coming off the wings and our seasoned attackmen.
“If we can win faceoffs and push some tempo, hopefully we can put some pressure on guys.”
Degnon (three goals and one assist) and senior attackman Connor DeSimone (two goals and two assists) paced Johns Hopkins. But the offense was plagued in the second half by nine possessions ending in turnovers and four more resulting in saves by Kirst (a game-best 12 stops).
“They ended up winning some more possessions and some more loose balls and faceoffs,” Milliman said. “So we didn’t have that span of time where we had the ball a lot.
“I thought for a good portion of the game. We were doing the right things on the offensive end and we were executing and having long possessions and wearing them down. But we’re not resilient enough as a group to trust what we’re supposed to be doing.”
The Scarlet Knights left Baltimore feeling a lot better about themselves after rebounding from a 19-12 loss at No. 3 Maryland on March 13.
“I know that in a big game like this on the road and wanting to redeem themselves after the loss to Maryland, I think everyone was looking to make sure that they left nothing on the field,” Brecht said.