Another grizzly effort for M. Lax

The men's lacrosse team lost at home, sending its Ivy League record to 1-3. Unfortunately for the Penn men's lacrosse team, Matt Schroeder is now intimately acquainted with the Brown lacrosse team's attackers. Schroeder came up with save after save of the Bears' shots from the perimeter, but half a dozen times he found opposing attackers standing virtually on top of him. Finding it hard to stop shots when they were being fired from inside the net, there was little the goalie could do as Penn sunk to the bottom of the Ivy League with a 13-9 loss Saturday afternoon at Franklin Field. The score was just 8-6 in Brown's favor after three quarters, but the Bears held the ball for seven consecutive minutes to open the final 15 minutes. By spreading out their offense and passing around the perimeter, the Bears kept the Quakers' defense moving and chasing, eventually wearing down the defenders. Penn's desire to force turnovers allowed Brown attackmen to slip into the interior of the defense and put three goals past a defenseless Schroeder. "We went into an offense that we normally play against a zone just because it was going to spread them out and give us easier opportunities to move the ball," Brown coach Peter Lasagna said. "They had to come out after us, which exposed them a little bit." The Quakers also were hurt by penalties. Junior defenseman Brett Bodner picked up a slashing call in the first minute of the fourth quarter. On the ensuing possession, Brown put together a couple of shots which were saved before freshman attackman Burke Gallagher netted one with 13:53 to play on an assist from Michael Satin. Quakers midfielder Bart Hacking landed himself on the sidelines for a minute with 8:43 to play. The Bears' Justin Clavadetscher capitalized 44 seconds later when he took a pass from attackman Michael Monfett and scored. "We had a couple chances where we got the ball on the ground and the got a stupid penalty and gave it right back to them," junior middie Jeff Zuckerman, who was the team's leading goal scorer on the day with three, said. Penn was also hurt in the faceoff category, where Brown won 20-of-25 faceoffs in the game and 7-of-9 in the pivotal fourth quarter. During its back-breaking seven minute possession, the Bears won both faceoffs immediately after its two goals, denying Penn any chance of getting an offensive possession. With the score 10-6 and only seven minutes remaining, Penn was unable to make up the deficit, having each of their goals answered by a Brown score. "We noticed that they were really looking tired," Brown sophomore middie Dwight Keyson said. "We put in our pressure defense and extended on them and it really seemed to work. That gave us the opportunity to get some transition and some good offensive opportunities." Brown's good opportunities would have turned into many more goals had it not been for the stellar play of Schroeder. The 6'2" junior, who entered the game with a .619 save percentage, picked up 23 more saves on 44 Bears' shots. Perhaps his most spectacular save of the game was a stoning of Monfett with one minute to go in the first half with Penn down 7-4. The Brown attackman had a clear run at the net after a Penn turnover deep in its own zone. Monfett charged to within feet of the Penn net, but he couldn't put the ball past the 220-lb. build of Schroeder. "I was seeing the ball real well in warmups and all through the game," Schroeder said. "Most of the goals they got on top were unsettled [balls]." The sunny afternoon at Franklin Field started much better for the Quakers than it ended. Penn scored just 56 seconds into the game on a goal by sophomore attackman Pete Janney. After a quick Brown response to even the score, Janney netted his second goal of the game two minutes later. "We had some intensity in the first couple of minutes [of the game]," Zuckerman said. "I think their goalie came up big; a couple of saves keeps us off the board in the first half. In the second half definitely the scrap was there. We started getting to the ground balls a lot quicker." The team suffered a major setback when Janney was knocked out of the game in the final minute of the first half with a sharp hit to the shoulder. The team was already playing partly shorthanded as senior tri-captain John Ward played the game with a heavily taped hamstring. Penn coach Marc Van Arsdale said he was surprised Ward was even able to run on the field. With Janney down, Penn did not have much of a scoring punch in the third quarter. Down 7-4 at the half, Penn only put two goals home until Brown had gone up 11-6 and essentially sealed the victory. "I think a big part of [controlling the second half] is that our midfielders dodged really hard from the beginning of the game," Lasagna said. "The book on us is that you don't have to move to Brown's midfielders. Today Penn had to think about sliding to our midfielders." At one point midway through the third, Van Arsdale appeared especially frustrated, yelling, "Get your heads in the game," loud enough for most of the front rows of the crowd of 700 to hear him. "The physical effort is there for us most of the time, but a certain mental sharpness not being there," Van Arsdale said. "I'll take as much credit for that as anybody." The Bears, who moved to 2-2 in the league with the win, were just 1-7 entering the game after six losses to ranked opponents. Their two Ivy losses were to the league's top teams, Princeton and Harvard. Penn meanwhile has little chance to match last year's encouraging 3-3 league record. Having already notched three losses, Penn is almost assured of picking up another when it faces Princeton in a couple of weeks. Van Arsdale said he wants to take it one game at a time, but this season isn't turning into one to savor.

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