No. 14 Syracuse Hosts UConn On Sunday Afternoon
3/25/2006 10:21:47 AM | Women's Lacrosse
SYRACUSE, N.Y. - The No. 14 Orange welcomes BIG EAST rival Connecticut on Sunday, March 26 at the Carrier Dome on High School Team Day. SU has never lost to the Huskies, but slipped by UConn 13-12 last season in Storrs. Game time is slated for 3:00 p.m. High school teams are invited to wear their school jerseys at the Dome on Sunday. To register your team, email TEAMSU@syr.edu.
Huskies Visit Carrier Dome For BIG EAST Showdown
No. 14 Syracuse hosts its fifth-consecutive game when Connecticut visits The Hill for a 3:00 p.m. contest on Sunday, March 29 at the Carrier Dome. The Orange has never lost to the Huskies in eight tries, but escaped with a 13-12 decision in Storrs last season.
In that game, Caitlyn Dragon and Jill DePetris both had two goals and an assist. Jen Kasel stopped 10 shots. SU led 12-7 with 13:00 left in the game, but UConn scored four goals in the span of five minutes to cut the deficit t one, 12-11, with eight minutes to go. DePetris tallied one of her goals with less than three minutes left to put the game away.
Kasel Tabbed BIG EAST Defensive Player of the Week
Senior Jen Kasel (Mountain Lakes, N.J.) was named the BIG EAST Defensive Player of the Week, announced today by the conference office. Kasel led the Orange to a 2-0 week with wins against Massachusetts and No. 18 Towson. For the week, she stopped 18 shots, allowed a mere nine goals, had a 4.90 goals against average, and a .667 save percentage.
Against the Minutewomen on March 15, Kasel saved three shots in SU’s 15-9 win. On March 19 against Towson, she stopped a season-high 15 shots in limiting the Tigers to five goals. Towson came into the game averaging 11.53 goals per game. The five goals allowed was part of a 7-5 win that ranks as the second-lowest scoring game in Syracuse history.
Kasel’s 15 saves was the most she has been credited with since she stopped 15 shots against Loyola in the 2004 season finale on May 8.
Last Time Out
Freshman Kathryn Rowan posted her fourth hat trick of the season and junior Gaddy Fortune scored twice to lead No. 13 Syracuse to a 7-5 triumph against No. 18 Towson on March 19 at the Carrier Dome. Senior Jen Kasel stopped a season-high 15 shots in the win.
Seniors Meghan O’Connell and Caitlyn Dragon recorded the other goals for the Orange and freshman Megan Mosenson dished out an assist. Dragon also tied her personal best with six ground balls. Sophomore Bridget Looney and freshman Bridget Hamm both tied their career highs with five ground balls each.
SU’s seven goals in the win is the second-lowest scoring output in a victory all-time at Syracuse. The lowest is a 6-5 win against Boston University on April 22, 2000.
No Place Like Dome
The Orange has been dominant at the Carrier Dome since the program began in 1998. In its inaugural season, SU went a perfect 5-0 at the Loud House. It lost just one game in three different seasons (1999, 2003, and 2005). The Orange owns a 55-14 all-time record at home and 11 of its losses came against top-10 teams.
The Syracuse-Connecticut Series
This is the ninth meeting between the Orange and the Huskies, with SU winning all eight previous meetings. In the teams’ first-ever meeting in 1998, Syracuse’s inaugural season, SU beat UConn 20-0, the largest margin of victory in Orange history.
Syracuse vs. Connecticut Series Information
All-Time Series SU 8-0
First Meeting March 28, 1998 (Syracuse 20, Connecticut 0)
Last Meeting March 26, 2005 (Syracuse 13, Connecticut 12)
Current Streak: SU 8
Scouting The Huskies
Connecticut lost its first three games of the season before winning its last two contests. The Huskies have played every game this season on the road and will not play a home game until they host Notre Dame after they face the Orange. UConn lost at Towson, 16-13, and edged Harvard, 12-11, in Cambridge. Shannon Burke, the team’s lone Preseason All-BIG EAST selection, is leading the team with 18 points and 15 goals. Abbey VanDeusen is the only other student-athlete with over 10 points on 10 goals and two assists. Kristen Haldeman has a save percentage of .550 and allows 9.80 goals per game.
March Madness
The 2006 schedule features 11 home games, which is the most since SU played 11 at home in 2001. The Orange went 10-5 that season. SU also hosts seven-consecutive home games in the month of March, which will be the longest home stand in the program’s nine-year history.
SU’S Most Lopsided Wins
The win against Binghamton on March 7 was one of the most lopsided in school history. The Orange beat the Bearcats 21-2. The largest margin of victory came in the program’s first year existence when it beat Connecticut 20-0 in 1998. That same season, SU topped Siena 19-0 and Albany 23-4. SU has outscored opponents by 19 four times.
Freshmen Leading The Way
The Orange freshman class has made an immediate impact in SU’s first seven games. Megan Mosenson and Kathryn Rowan have had a hand in 33 of Syracuse’s 85 goals, which is 39 percent. As a class, the freshmen have accounted for 39 percent of the team’s points.
Rowan leads the team with 21 points on 20 goals and one assist. Mosenson is fourth on the team with 12 points. She has registered nine goals and three assists.
Three Orange rookies tallied their first career goals against Binghamton on March 7. Maggie Martin and Allison Smuts both notched a pair of goals in the 21-2 triumph. Bridget Hamm also got on the board with a goal of her own.
Dragon A Steady Force
Caitlyn Dragon avenged SU’s loss to Dartmouth in the NCAA Tournament last year when she tossed a shot with one second left in overtime past the Big Green goalkeeper on Feb. 27. The game-winner gave Syracuse a thrilling 11-10 win over No. 3 in the nation.
Dragon, who is currently enrolled at graduate school at Syracuse, is third on the team with 10 goals and 13 points.
Last season, the Jackson, N.J. product finished fifth on the all-time single-season ledger with 40 goals and 55 points. Her 15 assists ranks ninth all-time in a single season. Dragon missed the 2003 season and earned a medical redshirt for the time she missed.
Going into last year, Dragon had compiled just seven goals in her previous three years. She played in just 15 games from 2002-2004. Last season, she played in 16 of the Orange’s 17 games. For her efforts, she was named to the All-BIG EAST First Team. Dragon also earned IWLCA/US Lacrosse Division 1 North All-Region First Team honors and was named a third-team All-American. This season, she earned Preseason All-BIG EAST honors.
DePetris Always There
Junior Jill DePetris is tied for the team lead with five assists this season, with three of them coming in SU’s thrilling overtime win against Dartmouth. She totaled only seven helpers the entire 2005 season. DePetris also leads the team with 14 caused turnovers and is second with 18 ground balls. Her 2.00 caused turnovers per game is tied for 15th in the nation. She posted her first hat trick of the season as she scored three times against Binghamton on March 7. She has totaled six goals on the year.
She has started every game since her arrival on campus, beginning all 39 of the games she played in since 2004.
DePetris was also named to the Preseason All-BIG EAST Team after earning second-team All-BIG EAST honors last year. In 2005, she started all 17 games and recorded 18 goals and seven assists. She also led the team in ground balls with 36. Her 18 goals topped her 2004 total by one. In her three seasons in Orange, the Radnor, Pa. product has not missed a game, starting all 34 contests.
Good Fortune
Junior Gaddy Fortune has provided the Orange with a lot offense early this season. So far, she has totaled 18 goals and two assists and her 20 points is second on the team. In 15 games played last year, she compiled just 10 goals. She has also totaled 10 ground balls, six draw controls, and five caused turnovers.
Against Binghamton on March 7, Fortune had the game of her career as she totaled five goals and six points, both career bests.
With :01 Left, Dragon Delivers
Senior Caitlyn Dragon scored with one second remaining on the clock in overtime to lead No. 13 Syracuse to an 11-10 victory against No. 3 Dartmouth on Feb. 27 at the Carrier Dome. The Big Green scored with 17 seconds left in overtime to tie the game before Dragon tallied the game winner.
Junior Chelsea Strodel secured the draw control with just six seconds left. Strodel then found classmate Jill DePetris who found an open Dragon right in front of the net. Dragon turned and fired a shot past the Dartmouth goalkeeper to push SU to the win.
Dragon finished the game with three goals and freshman Megan Mosenson also tallied a hat trick and assisted on another goal. Freshman Kathryn Rowan notched two goals for the Orange. DePetris had three assists, including the game-winner. Senior goalkeeper Jen Kasel saved 10 shots for SU in the win.
Singing A Melody
Senior Melody Agnew, a native of Winchester, Mass., couldn’t help but let her teammates score a year ago. She compiled 25 assists in 2005, the second-highest single-season total in school history. She also added 16 goals as she started all 17 games, which placed her third on the team in scoring. Kim Wayne is the only other student-athlete in Orange history who has amassed more assists in a season. She notched 25 helpers in 2003, and holds the record for assists in a season with 33 in 2002.
Agnew, who was held scoreless in the Orange’s first three games, broke out against Binghamton on March 7. She notched five assists, all in the first half, to lead SU to victory. That number is tied for the most assists in a game in the country this season. Agnew shares the feat with Monmouth’s Jeanette Stott. The assist total set a new career high for the senior who also scored a goal. The Winchester, Mass. native ranks fourth all-time at Syracuse in assists with 34 in her career.
Queen Of The Kasel
Senior Jen Kasel came up huge for the Orange in its wins against Dartmouth and Towson. She saved 10 shots in the game to hold the Big Green at bay on Feb. 27. Against Towson, she stopped a season-high 15 shots to lead SU to the 7-5 win. For her performance, she was named the BIG EAST Defensive Player of the Week. Kasel currently ranks 17th in the nation in goals allowed per game at 8.32.
She has also proven herself as one of the most dominant goalkeepers in SU history. Her 119 saves last season was the fifth-highest total in a single season. The previous year, she stopped 181 shots, just five behind the single-season leader, Clothilde Ewing. On the all-time ledger, the Mountain Lakes, N.J. native ranks second in saves with 351 in her career. The all-time leader in that category is Carla Gigon, who saved 475 shots in her illustrious career.
Kasel also made a mark in the single-game saves record books. On April 3 of 2003, she stopped 23 shots against Rutgers in a 15-5 victory. Ewing holds the record for saves in a game with 25. She achieved the feat on the same exact day in 1999. Kasel has started every game in net the last three seasons for the Orange.
Ain’t Nothin’ But A "D" Thing
The Orange defense has proved strong over the course of the first two games. The back line is allowing 8.31 goals per game and has caused 89 of the 130 turnovers it has forced in seven games, which comes out to 68 percent. The defense has also been strong on free position shots, as opponents have scored just 14 times on 58 attempts, a 24 percent clip.
Syracuse brought back every starter from last year’s defense that allowed a mere 8.76 goals per game, which ranked 18th in the nation. Junior Melissa Pearsall and sophomore Bridget Looney led the team in caused turnovers with 21. Pearsall started every game a year ago and and was third on the team with 30 ground balls. Looney participated in every game last season, starting 14. She was also second on the team in draw controls with 24 and picked up 22 ground balls. The Orange also returns sophomore Stephanie Bissett, who played in 16 games in 2005 and started 14.
2005 Orange Among Nation’s Best
Syracuse ranked among the country’s elite in team stats in 2005. Here is a breakdown of the ledgers:
Scoring Offense: 12.06 (13th)
Scoring Defense: 8.76 (18th)
Scoring Margin: 3.29 (14th)
Win Percentage: .706 (13th)
Home Games To Be Streamed Live On suathletics.com All-Access
Syracuse University Director of Athletics Dr. Daryl Gross announced today that it will offer live video streaming of all home men’s and women’s lacrosse games as part of the department’s All Access subscription service on www.suathletics.com. To subscribe to the Orange All Access package click on the Orange All Access on the school’s athletic website.
For optimal results in viewing streamed video, computers must have a high-speed internet connection and the latest version of Windows Media Player (a free download at www.microsoft.com/windowsmedia). Bandwidth constraints of service providers can affect the quality of the picture.
The All-Access service includes comprehensive video highlights, interviews, press conferences and behind the scenes features of all sports. All Access also includes live streaming audio of game broadcasts, as well as archived features and coaches shows. Cost of the All Access subscription service is $9.95 per month or $79.95 for a full year.
