No. 9 Rutgers Men's Lacrosse Hosts No. 4 Maryland on Sunday Night

[Caliknight]

Thanks Cali. On the cutters & pics, thought the Terps were effective with both in the 1st half.

One thing I see that other teams have is much more trust in their inside game. Our assists come from guys beating guys and slides and outside shots. Other good teams do that, but they also have a lot of belief in throwing the ball into the middle finding cutters and seeing them finish.

We have a couple of guys who are good at it, but it's an area of the field we rarely gets shots from, in settled offense anyway.

 

[Laxing4life]

No Bartolo or Connor Kirst being able to play up top and beat their man off a dodge while ripping a 100 mph shot as an attack. Kulas has stepped into that role with an entirely different skill set and our dodgers haven’t been able to adjust and bang it inside. Nor do they have confidence it seems. Something needs to give. Either the offense adjust or they replace him with another big body like Justin Kim. The other issue is now the health of Cameron. I’m guessing he’ll be out again based on his ability to walk after the 1st quarter. IMO, Scott needs to become a feeder 1st rather than a scorer 1st. He had 3 straight assist in the 4th as Rutgers was playing catch up. He’s capable of doing this.

 

[Caliknight]

Agree on the feeder. His goals will come.


Not having a hammer like Bartolo and Kirst completely changes our offense.

As a practical matter, donate. It's become very obvious. Players cost money now.

 

[RU Husky]

Wait til next year. Wait til next year. Wait til next year. Ever changing yet eternally the same.

 

[SirScarlet]

Wait til next year. Wait til next year. Wait til next year. Ever changing yet eternally the same.

not fair...we just went to a final four!!

 

[mdk01]

Wait til next year. Wait til next year. Wait til next year. Ever changing yet eternally the same.

I guess a Final Four doesn't mean shit. And everybody gets there all the time

 

[Degaz-RU]

Agree on the feeder. His goals will come.


Not having a hammer like Bartolo and Kirst completely changes our offense.

As a practical matter, donate. It's become very obvious. Players cost money now.

Earlier in the year, it looked like Kulas was going to be that hammer, but he has really trailed off the past several weeks.

 

[mdk01]

Earlier in the year, it looked like Kulas was going to be that hammer, but he has really trailed off the past several weeks.

Fewer opportunities on man up and other players drives.

 

[Wagram97]

Not to hammer a young player, but Kulas during the Princeton game looked like he'd be all conference this year. He had 5 pts, with 4 goals, including the best goal of the game, and 1 assist (though almost all of his goals that game were highlight reel goals). Heck, for that Utah/Princeton/UMASS stretch, Kulas had 13 pts (with 10 goals) and looked ready to make that jump.

Since conference play has started, Kulas has only 3 pts, all goals, in 4 games.

 

[RUTrack94]

11-8 is closer than I expected after seeing RU down 11-5 … RU secured a winning record … hopefully RU upsets PSU

 

[mattkamish]

I guess a Final Four doesn't mean shit. And everybody gets there all the time

Ha…some people are funny…

They posted a stat on TV last night sitting on my couch in Michigan that showed RU had a 16 game home winning streak. Last loss was an 11-7 loss to MD in March 2021…16 straight home wins…maybe RU fans are getting spoiled??

Watching from a far last night I realized how much I miss being at SHI for lacrosse games…kudos to a great crowd. My son was there, said it was a great crowd…

People just don’t get how hard it is to win and the last two teams were elite teams nationally…

2021 quarter final OT loss to #1 UNC…that game was as good as it gets in terms of high level talent and play all over the field.

Then last years trip to the final 4. Again, great wins and just got beat by the hottest team in lacrosse in Cornell who took a generational UMD team to the brink two days later

It’s so hard to win. So hard to get into the field and even harder to win a game. You can count on one hand teams that expect to get to final fours….

This RU team is 8-4. RPI is 11. Have been ranked in our just outside the top 10 all year…yet things are being viewed as a disappointment right now…that alone shows you how far this program has come…expectations are high, but we also should keep things in perspective…this is a very good team

Tough games ahead but they can win…but if they don’t, this group of young mean have won a lot of games for this university.

I believe this program is still on the rise and growth and the path to your goals is not linear….

Anything can happen in the BTT

 

[jreinsdorf]

One thing I see that other teams have is much more trust in their inside game. Our assists come from guys beating guys and slides and outside shots. Other good teams do that, but they also have a lot of belief in throwing the ball into the middle finding cutters and seeing them finish.

We have a couple of guys who are good at it, but it's an area of the field we rarely gets shots from, in settled offense anyway.

This. I gotta say, I enjoy your posts because you are not afraid to call it as it is. Schematically, I know you like our dodge to score philosophy, as do I. Lax is a shooters game after all. But we are so inadequate off ball its killing any chance of an inside game. It is most evident on EMOs. We rarely if ever see a guy open on the backside post for the open look at even strength or during EMOs. We simply have not recruited well enough to rely on athleticism alone. The ball will always move faster than the feet and we need, cutters, wheelers and guys who will make the "one more" pass.

 

[RU Husky]

I guess a Final Four doesn't mean shit. And everybody gets there all the time

So it stands to reason that last year’s outlier tournament run buys us, what, 4-5 years of not making another. Got it. It’s not like there’s hundreds of teams competing like in Division 1 football or basketball. Lacrosse is already competitively limited.

 

[mdk01]

So it stands to reason that last year’s outlier tournament run buys us, what, 4-5 years of not making another. Got it. It’s not like there’s hundreds of teams competing like in Division 1 football or basketball. Lacrosse is already competitively limited.

There are lies, damned lies and your bullshit statistics. Hundreds of teams competing in D1 football? Try 129. There are 75 D1 lacrosse teams. Not as many, but not competitively limited. In the history of the D1 football playoffs, how many teams have made that select group? Maybe 10 or 12? If you make a lacrosse Final Four every 4-5 years you are an ELITE program. Hell, with the AQs, making May Madness is a lot tougher than getting into D1 football bowl game. Just making the lacrosse post season is like playing in one of the major bowl games.

 

[DowntownT_Brown]

We have a couple of guys who are good at it, but it's an area of the field we rarely gets shots from, in settled offense anyway.

To me it seems Kulas is a natural fit for this role as his strength is shooting and assuming it is catch and shoot there isn't a need for extensive dodging.

 

[Caliknight]

So it stands to reason that last year’s outlier tournament run buys us, what, 4-5 years of not making another. Got it. It’s not like there’s hundreds of teams competing like in Division 1 football or basketball. Lacrosse is already competitively limited.

The season isn’t over yet and it’s not 4/5 years after the FF.

The goal remains the same in the program. That’s hasn’t changed.

 

[Caliknight]

There are lies, damned lies and your bullshit statistics. Hundreds of teams competing in D1 football? Try 129. There are 75 D1 lacrosse teams. Not as many, but not competitively limited. In the history of the D1 football playoffs, how many teams have made that select group? Maybe 10 or 12? If you make a lacrosse Final Four every 4-5 years you are an ELITE program. Hell, with the AQs, making May Madness is a lot tougher than getting into D1 football bowl game. Just making the lacrosse post season is like playing in one of the major bowl games.

This. Making a bowl game is meaningless there are so many. They even have to add teams with losing records it’s so watered down. Good for them but making the NCAA in lacrosse is much harder statistically than making a bowl game.

 

[Caliknight]

This. I gotta say, I enjoy your posts because you are not afraid to call it as it is. Schematically, I know you like our dodge to score philosophy, as do I. Lax is a shooters game after all. But we are so inadequate off ball its killing any chance of an inside game. It is most evident on EMOs. We rarely if ever see a guy open on the backside post for the open look at even strength or during EMOs. We simply have not recruited well enough to rely on athleticism alone. The ball will always move faster than the feet and we need, cutters, wheelers and guys who will make the "one more" pass.

We’ve been able to move the ball in the past better, some of they coming from the run game.

Getting more inside action will open up the outside game too. Just like in basketball.

I’m very high on the program but no team goes through a season without needing a serious look at what is happening.

 

[Caliknight]

Wait til next year. Wait til next year. Wait til next year. Ever changing yet eternally the same.

Who is saying that? You’re very hostile towards one of the best programs in the country and at the school.

I’m waiting till Friday. It’s going to need a Herculean effort to win there but we aren’t going there to be a practice dummy.

 

[rufamily]

Decker just doesn't have an offensive skillset. He's purely a D mid.

We don't have anyone that can take guys in the open field except for 21.

Putting a short stick in Reynolds hands, while is definitely an asset on D, it's a liability on O, at least as it relates to Nascar. He's an LSM IMO.

You can't help but look ahead to next year. What's our rope unit look like?

You have Splain and Jones at LSM and Reynolds at shortie. Who are the other guys?

I thought we'd see Dollive a lot more this year in the short stick role. He's a guy with offensive skills.

Man were we spoiled last year with our rope unit. We've had some good ones over the years but that group was special.

I think that there are lots of questions all over the field but SSDM will certainly be one of the but I would imagine you could see Dollive who is an excellent athlete but we also saw Macheca at ssdm. I would imagine that we will be looking in the portal again for players. who is going to replace the entire defense? Could you see Reynolds play at close does Mendyk get more run at close. Let's enjoy these kids and figure the rest out next year. But, yes we were really spoiled by our ssdms for the last few years

 

[loyalson66]

There are lies, damned lies and your bullshit statistics. Hundreds of teams competing in D1 football? Try 129. There are 75 D1 lacrosse teams. Not as many, but not competitively limited. In the history of the D1 football playoffs, how many teams have made that select group? Maybe 10 or 12? If you make a lacrosse Final Four every 4-5 years you are an ELITE program. Hell, with the AQs, making May Madness is a lot tougher than getting into D1 football bowl game. Just making the lacrosse post season is like playing in one of the major bowl games.

Great post.

People don't understand the cyclical nature of the sport. Look what happened to Duke, Hopkins and the Domers last year. Look what is happening in the Ivy this year. And I would also add that with the greater number of skilled players coming out of HS all over the country, it's no longer easy for the top programs to simply reload. There is now always going to be some new kids on the block. I offer Utah as one of them. After a slow start, they have reeled off 7 in a row since they lost to us. They have a great chance of being an AQ from the ASUN. Another example is UMass.

Because of greater parity, any elite program can find itself having an off year. Things don't always just fall into place. We have had a rough stretch since starting B1G play. That doesn't make us a bad team. I'm looking forward to the next two weeks, because we are capable of ruining anybody's B1G season

 

[DowntownT_Brown]

Just spit balling here but I think we should take a serious look at moving Shane Murphy to X and Scott to wing. We can potentially leverage Scott's quickness and create better angles for him in front of the cage and Murphy seems like a high IQ player who can develop into our quarterback which would pay off for years to come.

 

[Caliknight]

Great post.

People don't understand the cyclical nature of the sport. Look what happened to Duke, Hopkins and the Domers last year. Look what is happening in the Ivy this year. And I would also add that with the greater number of skilled players coming out of HS all over the country, it's no longer easy for the top programs to simply reload. There is now always going to be some new kids on the block. I offer Utah as one of them. After a slow start, they have reeled off 7 in a row since they lost to us. They have a great chance of being an AQ from the ASUN. Another example is UMass.

Because of greater parity, any elite program can find itself having an off year. Things don't always just fall into place. We have had a rough stretch since starting B1G play. That doesn't make us a bad team. I'm looking forward to the next two weeks, because we are capable of ruining anybody's B1G season

D1 lacrosse has never been more competitive. Look at how far Syracuse fell or the season that Penn St. is having after winning 3 games last year.

It's very hard to win consistently in lacrosse the margin for victory is smaller than ever. Duke and ND didn't even make the tourney last year and they could win the NC this year. Uva has an all generational team on paper but they have 3 losses.

Lacrosse is hard and we got here with one hand behind our back. Slowly that has changed.

If you care about winning, donate. Stick Fund, NIL, Stadium. That goes for everyone.

Those are the areas where we can have the biggest impact.

 

[Wagram97]

D1 lacrosse has never been more competitive. Look at how far Syracuse fell or the season that Penn St. is having after winning 3 games last year.

It's very hard to win consistently in lacrosse the margin for victory is smaller than ever. Duke and ND didn't even make the tourney last year and they could win the NC this year. Uva has an all generational team on paper but they have 3 losses.

Lacrosse is hard and we got here with one hand behind our back. Slowly that has changed.

If you care about winning, donate. Stick Fund, NIL, Stadium. That goes for everyone.

Those are the areas where we can have the biggest impact.

Yup, give every year and planning on upping the amount this year for the stadium. Also, thought I read that the stick fund is also tax deductible but don't quote me on that. Just recall reading that on a document regarding those options.

 

[biazza38]

It’s not easy to reload in this sport.
We’ve been very very fortunate to have some really good offensive weapons the previous seasons. This team is still talented, right now it’s just not top 10 talented. Nothing wrong with that. Just relative to previous seasons, it’s a down year

 

[mdk01]

It’s not easy to reload in this sport.
We’ve been very very fortunate to have some really good offensive weapons the previous seasons. This team is still talented, right now it’s just not top 10 talented. Nothing wrong with that. Just relative to previous seasons, it’s a down year

Might be a little early to discuss, but I believe this is the last year of the Ivy covid transfer pipeline. Princeton has a couple of difference makers that would really help next year.