April 9, 2007

by Matt DaSilva, Lacrosse Magazine Online Staff

Duke women's lacrosse coach Kerstin Kimel admitted she "wasn't in a good place" Saturday when a reporter from the Chicago Tribune asked her what she considered an innocuous question following the Blue Devils' 17-5 loss at Northwestern.

He wanted to know how the Wildcats looked in comparison to years past. Kimel brushed by him, offering only that her team did not show up to play.

It wasn't so much a slight to the 'Cats as much as it was a credit to them, Kimel said Monday.

"I think it's a really unfair question," she said. "I think at this point it's unfair to label them as better or not as good. Every team is different. They are different than they were last year and different than they were in 2005. But I think their mentality is the same."

And that's why the 'Cats are on the verge of becoming the most dominant women's lacrosse program since a certain College Park contingent won seven straight national titles. It's all killer instinct.

It has become a defining pattern for the two-time defending Division I women's lacrosse champion Wildcats: spin a setback, get a few feel-good splashes from the media, and make every subsequent obstacle in your path seem silly.

That's how it was with the flip-flop flap of 2005 and the confounding midseason loss at Duke in 2006 -- head coach Kelly Amonte Hiller always knew how to put the right spin on each rare, glancing blow to her team's invincibility.

So it was that the 'Cats lost their 2007 opener in overtime at North Carolina, only to turn around a week later and humiliate a viable opponent at Vanderbilt. It sparked an eight-game winning streak that included more national exposure for their role in the "Friends of Jaclyn Foundation" benefit game against UMass in Yorktown, N.Y. It continued Saturday with their undressing of Duke.

Since the loss to UNC, the Wildcats have outscored opponents 135-41.

According to Kimel, Duke's 20 turnovers came on just 28 possessions. Much of that could be credited to Christy Finch's five caused turnovers. Before Saturday, the Northwestern senior ranked second in the nation in that category.

"She is a roaming destroyer," Amonte-Hiller told the Tribune.

Duke lost despite holding Kristen Kjellman to a goal and an assist. Aly Josephs picked up the slack with six goals.

"The core of that group - Kjellman, Finch, Josephs - they know the secret," Kimel said. "They know how to push each other, and they don't like to lose. They perpetuate that culture of firing on all cylinders."

[CLICK HERE for a full photo gallery from the Duke-Northwestern women's lacrosse game.]

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Danowski on doorstep of rare feat

Before the season, Duke freshman Max Quinzani offered this perspective of playing opposite Matt Danowski:

"He's got no fear. He has the ability to absolutely control a d-man dodging from 'X...' He makes three or four looks every time he comes across GLE (goal line extended). He can create so much. And to receive one of those screaming passes, which are never lobs, you gotta be on your game."

Put a target out there, and Danowski will hit it, Quinzani learned early.

With four assists Saturday in No. 4-ranked Duke's impressive 11-9 men's lacrosse victory at No. 9 Johns Hopkins, Blue Devils attackman Matt Danowski is one assist shy of becoming just the 34th player in Division I history to eclipse the 100 mark in both goals and assists for his career.

Zack Greer was the primary beneficiary on Saturday. Four of Greer's game-high six goals were assisted by Danowski.

"We pressed Danowski. The goal was to put the ball in other people's sticks," Hopkins coach Dave Pietramala told The Baltimore Sun. "We did not do a good enough job accounting for [Greer]."

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Ivy Overhaul

The Dartmouth-Princeton women's lacrosse game in two weeks is the annual ode to the Ivy League. At this rate, however, either team will be lucky to finish second, thanks to the emergence of Penn and Yale.

First-place Penn (10-1, 4-0 Ivy), which won its seventh straight Saturday by handling Harvard, hosts Dartmouth and Princeton in the next nine days, which will go a long way to determining not only the league, but NCAA tournament implications for all four teams.

Yale (10-3, 3-1), meanwhile, has already run that gauntlet. The 15th-ranked Bulldogs' 6-5 overtime triumph of No. 9 Princeton was their sixth straight. They also beat Dartmouth earlier this season, but lost to Penn.

After falling behind 4-0 early Saturday, Yale responded with a four-goal run of its own, tying the game on Lauren Taylor's 48th goal of the season at the 26:41 mark of the second half. After the teams exchanged goals, Taylor then delivered the dagger with 10.4 seconds remaining, despite being guarded by Princeton's Katie Lewis-Lamonica.

"[Yale coach] Mandee [O'Leary] said, 'If you've got it, take it - I have all the faith in the world in you,' " Taylor told Yale Sports Publicity.

It seems as if the Ivy League, too, is anyone's for the taking.

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Stick Checks

Dan Groot's goal in double overtime Friday lifted Maryland to an 8-7 win at Navy. The Terps have won six of seven to improve to 8-3. They host reeling Johns Hopkins (4-4), which has lost three straight for the first time since 1996, on Saturday...Syracuse, hampered by inconsistent play and off-field misbehavior, likewise has lost three straight after a 12-8 loss at Princeton. The Orange, 3-5 and in danger of missing the NCAA tournament for the first time since 1978, hosts No. 1 Cornell in a critical game Tuesday. Princeton won behind a career-high seven points (5g, 2a) from Peter Trombino, as the Tigers jumped to an early 4-0 advantage they wouldn't relinquish. Princeton goalie Alex Hewit (12 saves) outplayed Syracuse counterpart Peter Coluccini (four)...A week after losing to lowly St. John's, Rutgers men's lacrosse responded with an eye-opening upset of eighth-ranked Loyola, a 17-7 win Saturday. It was the Scarlet Knights' first-ever win over the Greyhounds, who had won five straight. Rutgers' Mike Dugan scored three of his game-high four goals during a dominant second-half stretch in which the Knights reeled off nine unanswered goals...Temple seems prepared to reassert itself in Atlantic 10 women's lacrosse, after the Owls recorded a pair of one-goal wins last week to open conference play. They beat UMass, 11-10, on Friday before taking out A-10 preseason favorite Richmond, 9-8, on Sunday.

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Contact Matt DaSilva at mdasilva@uslacrosse.org.