By Tyler Smith, Sports Editor
“ The sticks kind of ran a little cold,” is how head coach Randy Mearns described the Bonnies’ agonizingly close loss to Quinnipiac Saturday.
With just over 10 seconds remaining, Bobcat senior Jake Tomsik found the back of the cage, breaking a 4-4 draw and sealing the victory over St. Bonaventure.
Mearns was fond of the effort the team put in defensively, but the opposition simply capitalized when it mattered most.
“They got the ball last and they scored,” he said.
The loss marked the third straight loss for the Bonnies following the first win in program history March 6 at Quinnipiac. Even so, the final scores have been far less decisive than those of the team’s first two seasons.
Offensively, the Bonnies have improved their goals per game average from six in their first two seasons to nine per contest in 2021.
Mearns said he believes the team has become a much better, cohesive club this spring.
“We’re a third-year program with the juniors, and our guys know we can go out there and win every game,” Mearns said. “We still have to win a few more statistical battles, we have to do a little better with face-offs, we’re getting good goaltending, the defense is playing strong. We just have to put it all together.”
During the shortened 2020 season, the Bonnies struggled to a record of 0-6. Not one of those six losses came by less than a five-goal margin. Sitting at 1-3 in 2021, the team has lost by four goals followed by back-to-back one-point heartbreakers.
Mearns said the team had its “head in the clouds” following the season-opening victory and was quickly “brought right back down to earth,” after falling to Detroit Mercy in its second matchup.
The Bonnies have had many different experiences already this season: a dominant win and a grounding loss followed by two close defeats, one being an offensive barnburner and the other a defensive battle.
The team now has to take these encounters and, like Mearns said, put it all together in Friday’s matchup vs. Manhattan.
“It’s going to be a battle,” said Mearns. “They’re older. They have five fifth year guys that are key components for their team. They have like seven or eight seniors. They’re very well-coached, and they’re familiar with each other.”
Mearns said that the Jaspers remind him of his own team in style of play as well as strengths and weaknesses, but until the game begins, he can’t speculate on how it might play out.
One area Mearns said the Bonnies could find an opportunity to take advantage is face-offs, citing Manhattan’s struggles in that department early this season. He cited the constantly improving play of freshman midfielder Austin Holley as a focal point in the team’s quest to refine that area of the game.
In a game dominated by the number of possessions each team has, Mearns said the team needs to emphasize winning the ground-ball battle, specifically the “50/50 balls.”
Ground balls go into the box score simply when a player scoops the ball off the ground, but Mearns said the Bonnies have to do a better job at securing the ones in traffic to get their possession numbers up, which could be the difference in a tight game.
“It’s the ones where there’s two of them and two of us and we have to get our share,” he said. “For the first couple games we haven’t really been getting our share. We got a few more against Quinnipiac, but we have to do a better job of that.”
The team has gone through adversity before, two seasons of it. The Bonnies got the monkey off their backs with the program’s first victory and have had more “heart and hustle plays,” so far this season, said Mearns.
They just have to find a way to produce more of those moments all over the field. Mearns said the team has been challenged, but they now have to find a way to positively respond to the challenges in front of them.
The Bonnies men’s lacrosse team faces the Manhattan Jaspers at 12 p.m. today at the Marra Athletics Complex and on ESPN+.
smithtj19@bonaventure.edu
