Men's lacrosse tests out new team at Fall Face-Off

This past weekend, men's lacrosse head coach Bill Tierney led a team onto the field for the first time in nearly six months. Back in May, Tierney's highly touted and senior laden squad endured a devastating 15-5 loss at the hands of Syracuse in the NCAA quarterfinals.

The team he took to the Fall Face-Off in St. Louis on Friday bore almost no resemblance to last year's bunch. The Tigers lost all but three starters from a year ago to graduation, including their first midfield line, and most of their defense and second midfield line. Princeton will also miss goaltender Julian Gould '03 and leading scorer Sean Hartofilis '03.

Remarkably, those player losses have done little to dampen the excitement of the coaching staff and the returning players.

"I haven't been this excited in 30 years," Tierney said as he prepared to look at tape from this weekend's action. "There's a new enthusiasm around here. The freshman class is 14 strong. They're great people and they're really good players."

They better be. And so far, they have at least proved their athleticism and willingness to learn. At the Fall Face-Off, Princeton played two early scrimmages against UMass and Ohio State before playing a full-length game against a very talented Notre Dame squad.

In the two scrimmages, the team worked on aspects of the game without putting emphasis on score or details. Tierney decided with the other coaches to play full field for part of the scrimmages, then work exclusively on situational lacrosse, such as focusing on man-up and man-down pieces.

When it came to Notre Dame, both teams put together what they had worked on in the morning and played a live match. The Tigers played the Fighting Irish to an 11-11 tie, surrendering an early 4-0 lead in the process.

"The trip couldn't have been better," Tierney said. "The weather was great, the place was packed, and we got to play a lot of people."

In fact, of the 15 people that saw action at midfield during the trip, 11 were freshmen or sophomores. Midfield will certainly be a position open to anyone who wants it. Junior Mac Bryson and senior Drew Casino are the only returning offensive midfielders who saw significant time there last year, and Tierney often uses Casino as a face-off specialist.

Junior midfielder Oliver Barry returns as well, though he plays defensive midfield and alternates between a short stick and a long stick.

Sophomore Jimmy O'Brien played on the first midfield line in St. Louis, and classmates Ryan Schoenig, Tony Vita and Hakim Thomson will all vie for playing time. With Casino injured on the trip, Thomson took the majority of the team's face-offs.

Two freshmen will also push for action at midfield. Peter Trombino was impressive in the Fall Face-Off and Scott Sowanick is possibly the most talented player in the freshman class. Both could also see time at attack.

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Attack, however, is the one returning strength for the Tigers. Senior Ryan Boyle returns for his encore year, ready to break some pretty lofty Princeton records if he can put up the same numbers as last year. Boyle is third in Tiger history in assists with 118. He trails second by only 15, but trails all-time leader Kevin Lowe '94 by 56. Last year, Boyle tied the school single-season record with 48 dishes.

Joining Boyle on attack will be junior Jason Doneger. Doneger was second to Hartofilis on the team last year with 41 goals. That total, however, was also the seventh most prolific year ever for a Tiger.

"Our strength is in a few key individuals," Tierney said. "But it is also in our athleticism and our youth. I don't want to think of this as a rebuilding year. We can be a pretty good lacrosse team. In four out of the six national championships we won here, we were not the most talented team out there."

The one player Princeton may find toughest to replace is defender Damien Davis '03. The defense returns just one starter in senior Ricky Schultz, and Schultz did not play due to injury in St. Louis.

"Damien was a pure stopper," Tierney said. "He could just take someone out of the game."

Princeton officially concludes its fall schedule this Friday, with a game against a Tiger alumni team. After that, it's just an offseason before the untested rookies get thrown into the fire.