The UMass Minutemen will be looking to get back on track tomorrow when they host the #7 Towson Tigers in a CAA league matchup at Garber Field in Amherst.
The Minutemen suffered a somewhat ignominious defeat last week on the road against the Delaware Blue Hens in their CAA opener. They did not seem like they were prepared mentally to face a Blue Hens team that was set to give the Minutemen their best possible effort. UMass will need to use the lessons learned in that game and apply them to facing a Tigers team whose offense is a force to be reckoned with.
The Tigers lowest goal output this season is eight, done in their lone defeat to Johns Hopkins. They’ve scored nine once, and in their other eight games they have scored at least 10 goals. UMass as a whole needs to be on top of their game Saturday, but no unit more than the close defense and goaltender.
The Tigers come in ranked #7 in the country, and from my admittedly brief research, it should be the first time that UMass is hosting a Top-10 opponent since 2012 when the Minutemen entered the NCAA playoffs at 15-0 and the #9 Cornell Big Red came to Amherst for the first round (and defeated the Minutemen 13-11). The previous instance was in 2009 when the #1 Syracuse Orangemen came to Garber and handed the Gorillas a 10-3 defeat.
Playing Towson tomorrow also gives the Gorillas a chance at a little payback. The Tigers beat UMass twice last season, including on a crazy last second goal in the CAA Championship game that sent the Tigers to the NCAAs and the Minutemen home. The chance for some revenge and to put a big dent in the Tigers 9-1 record should be a huge motivating factor for the Minutemen this week.
Consistency has been the Minutemen’s biggest issue all year. They need to figure out what causes the dips in their play and make sure they work to correct it. I do feel however that a game of this magnitude will bring out the best in this Minutemen team.
If I’m picking areas of emphasis outside of the defensive unit as a whole needing to play at their best, there are two that come to mind. They need to win the battle at the faceoff X, and they need to cash in when they have the man-up. They have been unable to do either with any regularity this season (particularly scoring with the advantage) and that needs to change for them to win this game.
The CAA is a tough conference to play in, a lot of quality teams that play tight, hard-fought games. The other downside is that despite the fact that there may be two worthy teams, it’s more than likely that only one CAA squad is going to make the NCAA tournament. If you’re UMass, you want to win your conference games to earn tiebreakers and set yourself up as the highest possible seed in the conference tournament. Getting the automatic qualifier is UMass’ guaranteed ticket to the dance, and that work began last week. They did not get off to the start they wanted, so I’m sure they are going to look to fix that tomorrow.
This game sets up to be a classic battle. If you can make it out I encourage you to do so. The weather should cooperate (knock on wood) to make for a good day for lacrosse tomorrow.
Go U.
Fire The Musket 