Terps defense leads the way to victory
Unit steps up on both ends of the field as offense struggles
COLLEGE PARK — Maryland men’s lacrosse likes to promote its defense as one of the program’s strongest pillars. Tasked with preventing goals, that unit demonstrated it can score them, too.
On a day when an offense outside of Eric Spanos sputtered with few moments of execution, the defense produced two goals and limited visiting Ohio State to its second-lowest output of the season to lift the No. 6 Terps to an 8-7 win Saturday afternoon before an announced 4,005 at SECU Stadium.
Graduate student goalkeeper Logan McNaney stopped 10 shots, including a stick save with 48 seconds remaining to cement the victory. He anchored a defense that kept the Buckeyes off the scoreboard for a stretch of 26:50 bridging the second and third quarters.
“The biggest thing was just giving Logan McNaney shots he wanted to see,” said senior
defenseman Ajax Zappitello, who collected two ground balls and two caused turnovers. “He’s one of the best goalies in the country for a reason, and we’re really cooking on all cylinders when we’re kind of able to let him see the ball really well, which he did an awesome job for us today.”
Junior attackman Jack McKenna amassed three goals and one assist for Ohio State, but Zappitello shut out junior midfielder Alex Marinier, who scored a career-high five goals in the team’s 14-8 win against Rutgers on March 30 and entered the game leading the offense in both goals (22) and points (23). Except for McKenna, the Buckeyes’ starting offense combined for two goals on 12 shots, two assists and nine turnovers.
“They did a really good job of changing matchups, mixing and matching who they were putting their short sticks on,” Ohio State coach Nick Myers said. “I think that in addition to the faceoffs and not having the ball as much as we would like, it just affected our rhythm offensively. It just felt like we couldn’t get into one.”
When Maryland (7-3, 2-1 Big Ten) wasn’t thwarting the Buckeyes’ offensive chances, the defense created some. With the score tied at 3 at halftime, Zappitello forced sophomore midfielder Blake Eiland into a turnover and got the ball to senior long-stick midfielder Jack McDonald.
McDonald carried the ball into the offensive zone and proceeded to rip an overhand shot between Ohio State freshman goalkeeper Caleb Fyock and the right post just 1:35 into the third quarter.
After Spanos, a junior midfielder, bounced a shot past Fyock with 11:32 left, the Terps pounced on a Buckeyes turnover at midfield. Sophomore attackman Braden Erksa got the ball to graduate student short-stick defen
sive midfielder Colin Sharkey, who passed the ball to graduate student long-stick midfielder Nick Alviti for a goal that was very similar to McDonald’s.
In an 8:15 stretch, Maryland embarked on a 3-0 run capped by goals from a pair of longstick midfielders. McDonald — who, like Alviti, scored his first goal of the season — credited defensive coordinator Jesse Bernhardt with encouraging the long poles to take reasonable risks.
“That’s something we always work on with Coach Bernhardt,” McDonald said. “When we have those opportunities in transition [and] just being able to can them, they’re big momentum goals. When you see a long pole score, it just gets the guys fired up. They carry a lot of weight. So just being able to work on your stick and having a good stick is everything.”
Spanos emerged as the most potent weapon for the Terps, racking up four goals and one assist. His presence was especially pivotal in the fourth quarter when he scored two goals in a 43-second span to turn a 6-6 tie into an 8-6 lead with 4:34 left in regulation.
But outside of Spanos, Maryland labored to find any consistency on offense. The starting unit accounted for two goals on 17 shots, two assists and 11 turnovers.
The group might have missed senior attackman Daniel Maltz (20 goals and two assists in nine starts), who was replaced by senior attackman Daniel Kelly, a Towson native and Calvert Hall graduate who went 0-for-3 and committed two turnovers. But coach John Tillman acknowledged the offense’s troubles against the 6-foot-2, 297-pound Fyock, who grew up in Bowie in Prince George’s County.
“A lot that we can work on,” he said. “I just felt at times we were out of sync. We were trying to do some different things, and then we’d get out there, and we weren’t all on the same page as much as we try. We tried to do some different things, but I think we’ve got to look at the film and kind of talk to some of the guys. I thought Spanos played great today. Braden, it wasn’t his best day, but I’m sure he’ll respond really well.”
Fyock made a game-high 11 saves to buoy Ohio State (6-6, 1-2), but the team had few answers for Terps senior faceoff specialist Luke Wierman. Not only did he finish 13 of 18 on faceoffs and pick up a game-best eight ground balls, but he also won 7 of 10 in the second half, including back-to-back draws that contributed to Spanos’ two goals to give Maryland an 8-6 edge.
“We had it knotted up, but we weren’t able to get another opportunity,” Myers said, pointing to Wierman’s performance. “We cut it to one and had a chance to tie it and maybe didn’t get as good of a look as we would’ve liked.”