Looking at the box score, one might think that the Army men’s lacrosse team got blown out by visiting North Carolina Saturday.
The Tar Heels, ranked fifth in the nation, won nearly 75 percent at the crucial faceoff X and controlled the ground balls, gaining possession of 36 of them to just 29 for Army.
But, box scores do not account for guts, hard team play and say little about a tenacious defense that simply would not break. And, those three factors made all the difference in the world as the Black Knights, ranked No. 9 entering the game, held off the Tar Heels, 13-12, before a raucous crowd of about 5,000 at Michie Stadium. It was the second straight year that Army has defeated North Carolina of the Atlantic Coast Conference by a 13-12 score.
“It was a full team effort,” said senior Jackson Eicher, who scored a career-high six goals on just 12 shots to lead Army. “I think it started on the defensive side of the ball, at the faceoff X, and Sean Byrne (10 saves) in the net doing his thing, which he has been doing all year.”
There was nothing easy about this game. Neither team managed more than a two-goal lead until Army went ahead 12-9 late in the third quarter. North Carolina managed to close that gap to just one, 13-12, with 6:16 left in the contest on an extra-man opportunity. But, despite a tenacious Tar Heel offense, including a swarming attack on the Army goal for most of the last minute of play, North Carolina could not get another good shot on the net to even the score and, perhaps, send it into sudden-death overtime.
“We came out and played tough, went after what we had to go after, and had a good idea what we wanted to do on the offensive end to try to produce as much as we could,” said junior Evan Plunkett, who had one goal and five assists for Army. “Our defense is that good, nothing gets by our defense. They are just really good players and they can play that way all game if they need to.”
While Army coach Joe Alberici loves to discuss the importance of winning the Patriot League title and its automatic bid into the NCAA Tournament in May, he was quick to add that his team defeated one of the best teams in college lacrosse this season. It also means that, for the second year in a row, Army, now 8-1 overall, won all five of its non-conference matchups.
Alberici was eager to highlight key players, ranging from Eicher’s goals and efficient shot selection, to Evan Plunkett’s five assists and his kid brother, freshman Hill Plunkett’s two goals and one assist. He also pointed out the steady play of Byrne in the net and the swarming defense, led by all-American AJ Pilate, Ryan Nixon and John Sullivan, not to mention Christian Fournier (five groundballs) and Christian Mazur (two groundballs).
It was a great bounce back game for us,” said Alberici, after Army lost its first game of the year last Saturday to Boston University, 10-9, in overtime. “I felt we played a little more like the Army team like we played in the first seven games. Offensively, we were really aggressive, off the dodge, we were attacking passing and got ourselves to good spots. Defensively, I thought our guys were outstanding on the ground.”
Alberici even pointed out that his two faceoff specialists, Robert Simone and Alec Vaccaro, who are filling in for the injured all-American Will Coletti, actually stopped North Carolina’s faceoff specialist Brady Wambach from creating transitional scores.
“He is one of the very best players in the country,” Alberici said. “He is not only an elite faceoff guy, but he is a terrific ground ball player and creates a lot of offense. I thought our guys did a nice job of not giving up any offense in that situation. Tough road for both of them, but they did do a great job.”
