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Lacrosse Preview: Showdown at the Shoe

Michigan heads to Columbus on Saturday to take on Ohio State in the Showdown at the Shoe.

By Peter Putzel
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Coming off a very good defensive performance, although in a loss against Fairfield last week, Michigan heads to Columbus to take on the Buckeyes in the Showdown at the Shoe this weekend.

Where and When

Date: April 12

Where: Columbus, OH

Time: 11:00 a.m. ET

Coverage: BTN

The Opponent

Ohio State is 4-6 overall, 1-0 in the ECAC, with a 3-2 record at home. The Buckeyes started out 0-2 after a triple-OT loss to Johns Hopkins in the first game of the season, followed up by a 12-11 OT loss to UMass. Although OSU has four wins on the season, only one of those victories (Bellarmine) has come against a team with a winning record.

Attack: sophomore Carter Brown is the leader of this group with 25 points on 15 goals and 10 assists, and his 21 GBs leads all offensive players in this statistic. Reegan Comeault's 19 points on 11 scores and 8 assists put him just behind Brown, while no other attacker has more than five goals this season.

FOGO/Midfield: Jake Withers will be the man going up against Brad Lott on Saturday. Withers is 73 of 147 (.497) at the face-off X, which really isn't that good. There is some nice upperclassman leadership at the midfield with guys like Turner Evans, Jesse King, and David Planning who have combined for 40 goals from the midfield. When it comes down to it, though, Jesse King is the man Michigan will have to watch. He's the team's leading scorer from any position with 19 goals, and he has 14 more points overall than the next guy (Carter Brown at 25). Check out this video of King vs Johns Hopkins...

Defense/Goalie: Robby Haus and Dominic Imbordino are going to try to batter the Michigan offense into submission; these two men have combined for 24 caused turovers and 49 ground balls so far this year. In net, the Buckeyes have started three different players: Nick Doyle, Scott Spencer, and Greg Dutton, with Dutton starting six games. One thing that Michigan will have to do to stay in this game is stop Dutton from doing what you'll see in the next video...


The Outlook

Michigan (4-8, 1-2)
 Ohio State (4-6, 1-0)
Goals-shots attempts 120-470 94-314
Goals scored per game 10 9.40
Shot % .255 .299
Shots on goal-attempts 260-470 194-314
SOG % .553 .618
Total Goals 120 94
Man-up Opps 17-43 (.395) 10-34 (.294)
Ground balls 359 282
Turnovers 175 140
Caused turnovers 92 67
Face-offs 157-309 (.508) 95-217 (.438)
Clears 209-235 (.889) 171-183 (.934)
Saves 115 86

To be honest, I don't know what to make of this match-up. It should be a good game just because of the rivalry between the two schools, but I see this game going one of two ways: it's either going to be an overtime-y scorefest with both teams scoring in the mid- to high-teens, or it's going to be a single-digit snoozer with the winning goal coming somewhere in the third quarter. Either way, you should probably DVR this game so you can either keep an instant classic or fast forward through all the sleepy parts.