Lacrosse Starts on Saturday

[Commissioner]

The Titans open the Lacrosse season when they visit Ohio State on Saturday. Game is at noon in the Woody Hayes Athletic Center. Ohio State, ranked 12th nationally in the preseason poll, played its opener yesterday, beating Furman in Greenville, SC.

[JimmyChitwood]

Its going to be tough to repeat, especially down there.

The win over OSU last year in Pontiac was a Top 5 Titan win (that I personally witnessed) in my 45+ years as a Titan fan. Great game. Great crowd. Great atmosphere.

[Commissioner]

Titans were drubbed 16-5 by #11 Ohio State today.

[Commissioner]

Lacrosse lost at Mercer today, 9-8.

Titans host Michigan on Wednesday, 7:00 pm at Ultimate Soccer Arena in Pontiac.

[Commissioner]

Men's lacrosse has had a tough time of it so far, starting 0-5. Lost badly to national powers Notre Dame (ranked #1) and Ohio State (#11) -- lost narrowly to Bellarmine (by 1), Mercer (by 1), and Marquette (by 2). Team is now off until conference play begins on the 19th at Manhattan.

[JimmyChitwood]

A rough start, but not really as rough as the record may indicate. They were beating a top 20 team in Marquette with about 4 minutes to go. 2 other loses were by one goal -- games we probably would have won last year. We were no match for Notre Dame or Ohio State though, but played very hard. I wish UofM didn't back out of their game. Our guys were pumped for that one.

We lost a lot of offense, and have one of the youngest teams in the country. We still have a great goalie and some very talented boys. Once the younger guys get some experience we should be fine, hopefully around conference tourny time (provided we finish in the top 4 in the regular season).

[Commissioner]

Titans won their first conference match 9-3 over Manhattan last week end. They have a final non-conference matchup on Saturday against Air Force. 1:00 p.m. at Titan Field. Will also be available on ESPN 3.

[uofdmik2008]

They are expecting attendance over 1,000 fans for this game, very disappointed that could not make it to this game, since the other game that I was supposed to go to against Michigan was canceled.

[Commissioner]

They are expecting attendance over 1,000 fans for this game, very disappointed that could not make it to this game, since the other game that I was supposed to go to against Michigan was canceled.

Attendance only reached 887, but still a home record for Detroit. Lost 7-5 to Air Force, which is ranked 20th nationally. The Titans went 0-6 in non-conference play, but 4 losses were to ranked teams and the other two by 1 goal each. That doesn't suggest we're an especially good team, but probably better than our current 1-6 overall record would indicate.

Titans next game is the home conference opener against Siena, next Saturday at 1:00.

[JimmyChitwood]

Our inexperience showed yesterday. We gave up a couple of easy goals early and didn't make plays we needed to make. We played a little sloppy early. The experienced players stepped up. There was one non-call against AF (obvious push) that turned into a quick AF goal at a critical time. I haven't looked at the stats but it didn't seem like we won many face offs.

Overall, a decent game. Our young team hung well with a top 20 team. We were not completely outmatched like we were at Notre Dame. Our losses, for the most part, were close games. We have only played one home game. We are 1-0 in the conference, which is all that really matters. We have gained some valuable experience against some very good teams. We should be set up about as well as we could expect going into the heart of conference play.

Nice crowd of almost 900. It was cold. If we want our fan base to grow, however, we need to have at least one more large bleacher (but probably 2-3 more). Given the 900 figure yesterday I would say the bleachers hold about 600. The rest had to stand along the track fence where you can't see that well. I got there early enough so the 7 people I came with could all sit together, but if we were 10 minutes later we would have had to stand which would have been disappointing. A student section would be fun. There were a lot of students at the game but they were spread along the fence. The crowd could get rowdy, in a good way, if we put the students together.

[uofdmik2008]

I am not too familiar with our conference opponents, out of the rest of the home games which one would you recommend as the must see this year?

[JimmyChitwood]

I am not too familiar with our conference opponents, out of the rest of the home games which one would you recommend as the must see this year?

I would say Marist. It will be senior day so the crowd will be large and it's the last game so the weather should be warmer. And Marist is 2-0 in the conference, beat UofM at UofM, and lost to AF is 4ots. Although it's early, the conference season is not that long and it could be a make or break game for the Titans since only the top 4 teams go to the conference championship.

[JimmyChitwood]

Titans need a win Saturday, for starters, if they want to continue their streak of making the MAAC playoffs. They need to beat Marist. Marist has a much better overall record of 7-6 and is 3-2 in the conference, but the Titans have played a fairly tough schedule but are only 2-9 overall and 2-3 in the conference. This should be a good game with a good crowd being senior day.

If the Titans lose their season is over, if they win, they need Monmouth to beat Siena, which is very possible.

Hope to see you at Titan field tomorrow.

[titanmac]

looks like we lost a bunch of close ones chit? what happened? anything different? a coaching change? young? inquiring titans want to know....

[JimmyChitwood]

We were one of the youngest teams in the country, had a fairly tough schedule, and couldn't pull out the close ones. The last couple of years we were getting big goals at big times. Not this year. Losing Shayne Adams at attack hurt a lot more than I thought it would. I think he put a lot of pressure on opposing defenses and opened up scoring chances for other players. They were a little weaker than that year, but the record was much worse.

We are kind of in the same situation with lacrosse as with all other sports, and competing against the big schools with less to offer. I don't watch recruiting much, but the Big 10 has 4 teams in the top 20 (that's all their teams except UofM and OSU). That can't help us. There is also very good lacrosse at DII and DIII schools. All DIII schools in Michigan have lacrosse and most DII schools do. I don't think we are losing a lot of players to them, but when there is not really a future in lacrosse I would bet some kids are choosing schools for reasons other than lacrosse, or where they can play a lot.