Syracuse lacrosse improvement starts right there with Chris Daddio turning his season around. That was the glaring problem throughout the year and it blew up in the Duke game.
The Syracuse men’s lacrosse team secured a berth in the four-team ACC tournament and is a virtual lock for the NCAAs after its 11-10 overtime win against North Carolina on Saturday.
Syracuse forward Jerami Grant will forgo his final two years of eligibility and declare for the 2014 NBA Draft, Sports Illustrated’s Pete Thamel tweeted on Monday afternoon.
On a Syracuse radio show last week, head coach Scott Shafer established the first line of success for his second season, a victory total that he would like to see his team accomplish or exceed, and that number is eight.
What looked like a rout turned into a nail-biter as the Orange, down 6-3 at half and looking stymied by the Tar Heel D, stormed back to tie things up at 7 going into the fourth quarter.
Randy Staats scored a career-high nine points on five goals and four assists, and Kevin Rice chipped in with three goals and four assists as Syracuse defeated Cornell, 14-9.
Just a few days removed from an emotionally draining win over Duke, Cooney drained nine 3-pointers, including nine-straight Orange points to push the lead to 54-44 lead with 4:19 left after the Irish had pulled to within three points.
Randy Staats went on a personal 4-0 run in the second half that turned a 8-6 deficit into a 12-6 lead, and Syracuse was never seriously challenged the rest of the contest.
As always, Syracuse will need to pay close attention to the opposing team’s faceoff specialist. In this case, it will be Cornell’s Doug Tesoriero, who has won 53 percent of his faceoffs this season, though he did struggle against Harvard.
There’s no question that Syracuse guard Trevor Cooney had an up-and-down sophomore season. The shooting guard started the season well, hitting 43 of 86 shots from beyond the arc in non-conference play.