Familiar mistakes cost Syracuse women's lacrosse team another game against UVa

By: Didier Morais

Posted: 3/2/09

Gary Gait spent the past week analyzing every second of footage from last year's game against then-No.2 Virginia. The Syracuse head coach wanted to prevent his team from making the same errors that triggered a scorching second-half performance from the Cavaliers, in which SU allowed eight goals en route to a loss.

But after the Orange's 14-11 loss against Virginia Friday, Gait couldn't help but feel like he just pressed the replay button on all the film he studied, noticing the numerous similarities between last year's game and this season's defeat.

The mishaps on draw controls, the loss of possession, the missed loose balls, the sputtering offense and junior Halley Quillinan's yellow card all reminded Gait and the Orange players of images from last year's post-intermission demise.

"A little bit," Gait said, when asked if the loss reminded him the previous matchup. "Not quite as bad. We just couldn't come up with those draw controls in the second half. We missed some loose balls it looked like we had. We went to scoop them, but just missed them. We just didn't finish the game. Those types of things reminded me of last year."

Going into halftime, the scene resembled last year's outlook. The score was at an impasse. Katie Rowan, Christina Dove and Quillinan all had productive first halves, combining to compile a majority of SU's goals. And both teams needed a favorable second-half showing if it expected to break away from its counterpart.

For the second consecutive year, Virginia jumped out to a quick lead, netting the first four goals of the second half and swiftly seceding itself from Syracuse. Despite all the studying, Gait started to relive last year's nightmare.

"The second half, we definitely could've come out more focused, ready to go and just going after all the loose balls," Rowan said. "We didn't have much possession on offense like we normally do."

For Rowan, this regular-season loss carries more weight than any other. The senior attack potentially squandered her last opportunity to beat arch-rival Virginia. During her four-year tenure at SU, Rowan, along with the other seniors on the team, has never savored a victory against the Cavaliers.

Last year, Bridget Looney's injury played a vital role in the Orange's inability to beat the Cavaliers. This time around, Syracuse had no excuse and lost playing at full strength, eliciting feelings of distress from the Orange seniors.

"It's definitely something we as seniors were thinking about going into the game," Rowan said. "We wanted to beat Virginia, but we just didn't come today and play our game."

Despite allowing the Cavaliers to take a considerable lead, SU surged right back, cutting the deficit to two goals with 15 minutes remaining. But that was the closest it would get for Gait's squad.

Each time Syracuse inched closer to Virginia, the Cavaliers would respond with a momentum-shattering score. And like last season, Virginia strung together three clutch goals in the last nine minutes of the game, essentially ending SU's hopes at victory in repeat fashion.

The comparable second-half schemes weren't constructed by design. Virginia head coach Julie Myers rarely referred to last year's game-planning tactics in preparing for this year's Top 5 meeting.

"We didn't really look at last year," Myers said. "We look at the players we have on this team, the things that we do well, and try to bring out each other's strengths given this year's team. A lot of players were there last year, so hopefully they're a little bit more experienced, a little better and more accurate."

That extra year of improvement and maturity showed. The same players that hammered Syracuse in 2008 plagued it in 2009. Virginia midfielder Ashley McCulloch, who accumulated a game-high four points in the previous match, finished with a game-high seven points in this victory.

Even Gait acknowledged that the Cavaliers' performance noticeably nullified his studies in the film room.

"There's not a whole lot you can do when they're not making any mistakes and finishing their shots," Gait said. "We took some risks, we went out and pressured. They answered and finished on their opportunities."

dsmorais@syr.edu