Cortland men’s lacrosse faced defeat against their rivals, the Ithaca Bombers this Wednesday, April 17th.
Cortland put up a fight with a close-scoring game but fell short of a 12-11 lead that the bombers kept from the beginning of the game. The Bombers had taken advantage of the extra-man opportunities and had set the tone of the game with immediate two goals from the start.
Offense from both teams was overall equal, Cortland allowing 34 shots from Ithaca while taking 33 shots on offense. A point where Ithaca had thrived compared to Cortland is the number of faceoffs won. Cortland had won 7 faceoffs, while Ithaca had won 20.
Zach Perlett, a junior offensive midfielder has expressed his evaluation of the game and how the bombers had capitalized on Cortland’s weaknesses to win.
“Both teams were very sloppy in the beginning,” Perlett said. “But they were able to take advantage of it and we lost our energy.”
A junior goalie on the team, Owen Folkwein, has said how the team’s energy is crucial for success and that they need to stay hopeful. Even though the Bombers had scored twice in the beginning, Cortland could have recovered from this if they were determined.
“Our team dynamic needs to work on maintaining a positive mindset when things get down,” Folkwein said. “So we can keep the possibility of coming back and winning.”
Cortland has been focusing on improving their team dynamic and defense, but they had overlooked working on their offense. Ithaca had used a zone against them that they were not prepared for and it was detrimental to achieving a win.
“Ithaca played man into the zone, and it threw off our offense,” Perlett said. “Not allowing us to find a rhythm.”
The Red Dragon’s new focus will be on making their offense more flexible and able to adapt to new changes. These adjustments on top of keeping a positive mindset should help increase the possibility of more wins in the future.
Since SUNYAC playoffs are approaching very quickly, the team needs to fix their small errors and recognize what needs to change for a better outcome.
“I am confident we will learn from this, as we do every other game,” Folkwein said. “We need to fix all of the mistakes at one time, so they benefit.”
Recognizing where faults have happened is the first step for the team to have a more successful outcome, but they need to apply themselves to fix all of these mistakes and it will take a lot of effort.
SUNYACs will be the final test to see if the team has learned what creates a perfect execution on the field and how far they can go depending on how hard they fight. Cortland’s next game is this upcoming Saturday, April 20th against SUNY Oneonta at 1 pm.