You never know about the weather in Maryland. In fact, the old saying is, if you don’t like the weather in Maryland, wait 10 minutes and it will change.  And this week it definitely changed. Forty one degrees at game time with some scattered flurries and 30 mile per hour wind gusts. Have you ever played lax in high winds? The gusts will wreak havoc on your stick. It will make you feel like you’re running up hill the entire game as well. It was bitter out on the field and my camera felt like a block of ice in my frost bitten hands. I gotta admit, I almost sat this one out, but Tom had made such a fuss about Stevenson’s new athletic complex and their fast paced, free-style brand of lacrosse, that I had to drive the 12.4 miles over to the Owings Mills campus to check it out. It’s hard to believe that this is my 4th game of the year and we’re still in February. No complaints here, just an observation.

Boy's Latin grad Ryan Rubenstein (17)was all over the place, pestering everyone.

The unranked Tigers of Hampden-Sydney were in town to take on the the 7th ranked Mustangs of Stevenson University. This is my first time seeing HS, so I was exited to see what they had to offer. It didn’t take long to realize just what that was. I noticed it while I was watching their warm ups. What they offer are GIGANTIC players. Six players on the Hampden-Sydney squad top 6′-4″! Two of their starting attackmen, Ryan Martin and Micah Keller are both 6′-5″. They are a stark contrast to the small speedy players that form the Mustangs starting midfield and attack units. As the opening whistle blew, all I could think about was how quickly I was leaving as soon as Stevenson grabbed an 8 goal lead, which I had assumed would be before half time. Never happened. Not by a long shot. The Tigers came to play. I think HS could sense our strong media presence and brought up their “A” game to impress.  D3 ball loves 24 Seven Lax, and vice versa.

Ian Bolland robbing Nate Cundy of a sure goal.

The chilly weather and high winds kept the ball on the turf and flying out of bounds for most of the first quarter. This wasn’t the first game of the season for either club but it looked that way early. Justin Lea got the Mustangs going with an unassisted goal just 34 seconds in. Big Micah Keller would redirect a feed from Big Ryan Martin to even the score a few minutes later, but for the next 18 minutes the goals would remain empty. You could tell that Stevenson wanted to press early on offense but some stingy net-minding from the Tigers’ Davis Noftsinger (12 saves) and a few early fouls kept the ‘Stangs from getting anything going. They extended their poles and bombarded the HS middies with back checks and rusty gates in an effort to regain possession and put away the Tigers early. I liked the aggressive approach of the Mustang long poles but it would get them into foul trouble later on. The teams would exchange a few goals before the halftime buzzer. HS 3, Mustangs 3.

Justin Lea splitting the double team.

At this point I went and hid inside the Stevenson Football locker room to get warm. It was a blissfully cozy 12 minutes to say the least. I reenacted that scene from Rudy while standing on a coaches chair and chanting those famous lines from Knute Rockne…..oh, wait. Forget I said that. That never happened. Back to lax and the field.

It’s still cold.

Thomas Armstrong would break the tie for the Tigers just 2 minutes into the 3rd quarter. Stevenson answered with goals from JP Coombe and Justin Lea shortly after. Lea’s goal was on an extra-man opportunity thanks to an obvious pushing foul. Hampden-Sydney’s Micah Keller would bag yet another goal to tie the score at 5 thanks to a Parker Bratton slashing penalty at the 4 minute mark.  Stevenson would commit 2 more fouls in the final 3 minutes of the quarter. The Tigers would fail to convert on both EMO chances. At this point the pushing and shoving would begin to increase as penalties began to dictate the pace of the game.

Needless to say, this was one of several pushing fouls called on the day.

The forth quarter would see 2 illegal body checks inside the first 2 minutes of play committed by both squads. The shoving increased to the point that the refs had to get involved to break up the scrum. I could sense that the Tigers were fired-up about pulling off a major upset on the road and perhaps the Mustangs were a bit steamed that they hadn’t put the visitors away by now. Or maybe both teams were ticked off that they were all wearing shorts and no one else in the state was at that time. Did I mention it was cold?

The refs had to get between a few players on several occasions.

Stevenson failed to convert on their 2, minute EMO chances, but thanks to a sweet steal by Mustang Junior middie Peter Green, Stephen Banick was able to bag a man-down goal at the 11 minute mark. I thought that might have been the back breaker for the Tigers. I can’t think of anything worse than giving up a goal while you’re man up, especially in a tie ball game but HS wouldn’t go away. Green was called for pushing a short time after the go ahead goal and Micah Keller bagged yet another EMO tally for the Tigers to tie the game at 6.  That was as close as the Tigers would get as Pat Candon and Green would score again within 3 minutes to give Stevenson an 8-6 lead. Candon would bag an insurance goal with 3 minutes remaining to ice the win for the Mustangs.

Tyler Reid going airborne to fill the net, sweet kicks and all.

All in all both squads would rack up 19 penalties for a total of 23 minutes on the afternoon. That’s absurd. But at least it wasn’t boring. I love D3 and D2 ball. There is far less coaching going on during games. The players are allowed to play their own style of lacrosse and you hardly ever see a stall warning. Compare that to the first 3 minutes of the Hopkins game played the same day. The D3 game reminds me of the older, faster version of lax that I grew up with.  Go check out a D3 or D2 game if you can. It’s worth it. And bring a jacket and a blanket, it’s cold in February, remember?

Check out the gozillion pics I took of this game on our Facebook page.