Minnesota, week 5 of the PLL season is here with two games on Friday and two games on Saturday. This is the final regular season weekend until the All-Star break in Boston at Gillette Stadium.
WOODS VS. ARCHERS
Friday night begins with the 1-3 Redwoods (ROLL ‘WOODS!) against the 2-2 Archers. The Archers are coming off a 9-10 loss to the Atlas in a game that saw Trevor Baptiste dominate at the stripe: winning a staggering 19 out of 22 faceoffs. Even with Baptiste’s dominance the Archers must be feeling pretty good about their situation. Head Coach Chris Bates will not have last season’s Points Leader, Grant Ament, in the lineup, but he will have Connor Fields and Warren Jeffery on the field. Last week the two starters were on the 21-man Restricted Roster, but not a part of the 19-men who suited up on gameday. Their return to the field could be the boost the Archers need to get the win in Minnesota.
The Redwoods also lost a 1-goal game last week to their bitter rivals Whipsnakes. The lopsided rivalry against the Whips has ended the ‘Woods’ season for the last three years. Head Coach Nat St. Laurent will be without two key pieces in the defensive midfield. SSDM Jack Near & LSM Kyle Hartzell will be out due to injury for this matchup with the Archers. The lethal Archers midfield features the great Tom Schreiber and his speedy, lefty running mate Ryan Ambler. Coach Nat did bring back SSDM Patrick Harbeson who played on his team for the last three seasons but was surprisingly released to the Player Pool after training camp this summer. The familiarity between Harbeson and the Woods should make for a smooth return into the lineup. Another roster choice the Redwoods staff must make is who the 5th pole should be, Ryan Kennedy or Finn Sullivan? Does Coach Nat play Sullivan who started for the Redwoods for the last two seasons on Close D or Kennedy the undrafted rookie. Sullivan and Kennedy both will be playing out of position at LSM as they are naturally close defensemen. I reckon Coach Nat opts for the more experienced lefty Sullivan over the rookie. This could be a close contest, but with the ‘Woods down a couple men, and the Archers getting a couple back--be on blowout alert. I’m not a betting man, but if I was my money would be on the Archers.
ATLAS VS CHROME
Game 2 of the weekend is set to be a heavyweight fight! The 4-0 Chrome -I bet you can’t believe you just read that phrase- who sit at the top of the standings are set to take on the 3-1 Atlas. League leading, Chrome is doing it with a good defense and an offense lead by their two rookie draft picks Brendan Nichtern (Army) and Logan Wisnauskas (Maryland). Team Captain John Ranagan, the Giraffe, has only played in one game this season and Jordan MacIntosh, the other Captain, has missed one game due to the birth of his child. Still the Men of Chrome keep finding ways to win. The improvement to the defense is staggering and that is due to top cover-man JT Giles-Harris. The former Duke defenseman, who missed last season due to injury, has boosted the Chrome defense. Even with a poor performance from the offense, the Chrome defensive midfield picked up the slack last week at Homewood. As a part of the SSDM Army the points from Will Haus, Ryan Terefenko, and Mike Messenger were invaluable. They came together with five huge points in their win, the most important of those came from Terefenko who scored the game-tying goal in regulation and Messenger who scored the game winning goal in overtime. Both men looked more like offensive midfielders, who says D-Middies can’t score great goals!
The goalie matchup and the faceoff stripe will be positions to watch in this game. Trevor Baptiste and Connor Farrell sit at 1st and 3rd respectively in Faceoff Win Percentage. Expect a back-and-forth battle and don’t be surprised if Baptiste gets hot and look out for the Atlas O to get on a roll and keep on rolling all night long. Jack Concannon and Sean Sconone also both sit 1st and 3rd respectively in Save Percentage. The Atlas Offensive Midfield has too much sauce! Who does Coach Rubeor put on the game day roster this weekend? An interesting announcement was made during the week, that Chrome Head Coach Tim Soudan will not be on the sideline for the game due to medical reasons and Assistant Coach Jacques Monte will step in to lead The Men.
CANNONS VS CHAOS
Game 3 of the weekend features the two teams at the bottom of the standings, who desperately need a win to stay in the top 7 spots for a playoff appearance. The Cannons have dressed two Faceoff men in two games. Game 1 against the Waterdogs in their only win of the season and game 4 in a loss against the Chrome, a game the Cannons feel they should have won with a lead in the fourth quarter. It might be Kelly VS Kelly (no relation) at the stripe, or we could see Bones Kelly and Alex Woodall vs Tommy Kelly. The Cannons will be looking for more production from their midfield with Asher Nolting moving full time to attack. Stephen Rehfuss and Jake Froccaro last week combined for 0 points and 7 turnovers. Coach Quirk made some roster moves during the week by surprisingly releasing Brendan Bomberry, to the Player Pool and adding rookie Jonathan Donville (Maryland) to help boost the midfield. The Cannons defense has changed all four weeks of the season, Coach Quirk is looking to solidify that end of the field which is giving up the most goals against per game at 14.5.
The 0-4 ‘Aos Boys will have had a full week together with their NLL teammates who returned to the field last weekend. Coach Towers will hope the extra week will be enough to push his team to their first win of the season. Hopefully, we get to see the much-anticipated debut of Tehoka Naticoke. In addition, Chris Cloutier who missed last week due to injury will be back in the red and black. Blaze is still Blaze in cage and his clean saves are leading to fast breaks. No idea how this game plays out, but I do know we get to see the great Lyle Thompson play lacrosse, so just sit back, and enjoy the show.
WHIPS VS DAWGS
The final game of the weekend is a contest between the 4-0 Whipsnakes and the 1-3 Waterdogs. The Dawgs got their first win of the season last week in Baltimore in a blowout win against the Chaos. The Whips won a nail bitter against their rival Redwoods. Dillon Ward returned to the roster last week, but did not play, as Matt DeLuca got the nod in goal. Will we see Ward or DeLuca in cage in Minnesota? My money is on the Canadian if I was betting. The Whipsnakes D is as good as it has ever been, especially with the return of SSDM Tyler Warner from med school. In this rematch I expect a similar result from the first game of this season. The Whips add Zed Williams who missed the first game because of the NLL Finals. The Waterdogs will be without Steve DeNapoli, Mikey Schlosser and Jake Withers, who were major contributors last season which saw the Waterdogs at the top of the league. Last game Michael Sowers and Tim Muller exchanged some words which were caught on the Mic’d Up recording. Will there be another flare up between the two this weekend?
The matchups in Week 5 will see some major battles. Enjoy the weekend ladies and gentlemen.
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