Syracuse vs. Siena
NCAA Tournament – First Round
Sunday, May 10, 2009
Carrier Dome/Syracuse, N.Y.
Head Coach John Desko
Opening Remarks:
“Well, it really felt a lot closer than that. I thought Siena did a very good job coming here, especially in the first half controlling some faceoffs, controlling the tempo of the game. I thought their goaltender, when we did have some opportunities, really came up big for them especially in the first half. Defensively, I thought we played well the whole way through. I thought John [Galloway] did a nice job. Like their goaltender, I thought he made some very nice saves in the first half. We came out in the second half and played some good defense.
"I was not happy with the execution of the offense. I thought we had way too many turnovers for this kind of game. We talked about it before the game, we talked about it at halftime. We needed to take care of the ball. Siena had won some faceoffs and they had the ball for periods of time at their offensive end of the field, and when we got it, we needed to get some good movement, control it and work for some good shots because he had made some nice save in the first half. Finally, we had some unsettled situations in the fourth quarter and started to pull away. My hat's off to Siena, though. I thought they played a very good lacrosse game today.”
On Cody Jamieson’s performance in his first start:
“It was very good. I thought, without taking anything away from Siena, that Cody was excited to play after getting his first start of the season. He got us the early goal and some big goals in the second half. I think he had three on the day and they were all pretty big goals. It was good that he was excited to play and we needed somebody that was shooting well against their goaltender and he was able to penetrate and get closer to the goal. They actually put a short stick on him a couple of times and we weren’t unhappy about that.”
On starting Jamieson:
“Cody has practiced with us all spring, but we haven’t had him in a lot of the situations with the first group just because he couldn’t play in the games. We got the word [from the NCAA] a couple a weeks ago, so we’ve been able to put him out there more with the first group and I think he’s gotten more comfortable working with those guys. He’s shown what he can do in practice and in a game and I think he did a really good job for us tonight, again, making some really important goals and finishing the ball against what I thought was a hot goaltender.”
On Syracuse’s riding and clearing:
“I think guys like Joel White had another big day creating some unsettled situations and getting the ball to the other end of the field. I think our defense was stingy all day and what’s good is that we’ve been clearing it a high percentage of the time and we really stress that, especially tonight when the game was close. I think our defense played within themselves and just getting the ball to the other end of the field. I know we were 10-10 at the half for clears and I see here we were 24-26, overall. That’s getting the ball over almost every time and we rode Siena 11-for-19. That’s eight possessions we got back in their clearing situations and those are big for a team like us.”
On how the team approached this game throughout the week:
“Yeah, the guys sounded pretty good all week. This is always a juggling act. The guys have finals all week and we had graduation earlier today. We had a couple guys miss practice throughout the week, but I thought they stayed pretty focused and I was happy with their emotion before the game and at halftime.”
Cody Jamieson, Jr., Attack
On what clicked for the offense in the second half:
“It was just execution. We were getting shots in the first half. The goalie was hot and we just executed better in the second half.”
On competing with Chris Daniello and Tim Desko for a starting spot:
“We actually don’t go at each other too much. We try and help each other as much as possible. Those guys have seen more minutes than me so I’m always asking them questions and they’re asking me questions. I think it’s just healthy competition. If you don’t run with the starting group, you know, we have guys like Max Bartig and Peter Coleman and those guys aren’t too far of a step down. It’s just a good, healthy competition between us.”
John Galloway, So., Goalkeeper
On Siena trying to slow the game down:
“I think we were a little bit slower than we normally are as a Syracuse team. We made the adjustments at halftime and I think we changed the tempo of the game and I think that shows a lot about our offense; being able to make the right adjustments. We were able to get the tempo back to our kind of style and with guys in there like Cody [Jamieson] and Nimmer [senior attackman Kenny Nims], they always step up. It’s just an offense that you can’t hold that type of tempo for 60 minutes and I think that was the biggest difference.”
On facing Siena goaltender (Brent Herbst) who leads the country in goals-against average:
“Yeah, you know, you always see the guys who are ahead of you and you always want to be the best you can be. He’s a great goaltender and I really think he kept that team in the game for awhile tonight. You always want to outplay the other goalie and help out your team. That’s the ultimate goal. He was helping out his team and that’s our goal every night.”
