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Carlisle
Hubert Gilroy
723 W. Penn Street
Carlisle, Pennsylvania
17013
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 News: CARLISLE TOO TOUGH FOR WARWICK IN LACROSSE |
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Tuesday, April 7
CARLISLE TOO TOUGH FOR WARWICK IN LACROSSE
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Last updated: Saturday, March 28, 2009 9:22 PM EDT
Carlisle head coach Steve Kidder will admit his team doesn’t possess the league’s best stick handlers.
But the Thundering Herd does possess an attribute that more than made up for any short comings — athleticism.
Carlisle stayed ahead of visiting Warwick with five unassisted goals through the first three quarters, then iced the game on an acrobatic pass-around shot in the fourth to win its second straight game, 6-4, on Friday.
“Our team is very athletic,” Kidder said. “We know we can dodge and get an advantage on a team. We don’t have the best stick skills ... we have athletes that get into good position.”
The Thundering Herd (2-1) showed off their moves often, netting three goals in the first quarter on unassisted shots taken into the zone by three different players. Attacker Rob Gilroy sank Carlisle’s first goal less than four minutes into the game, reserve Tyler Getz put the Herd up by two with a strike inside the sixth minute and mid Sean Kunst scored with 2:42 left in the opening quarter for a 3-1 advantage.
“Out of the gate, it wasn’t the way we wanted to start,” Warwick head coach Chris Schmehl said. “We felt like we were playing from behind.”
Kunst’s first-quarter goal was most indicative of his team’s athletic ability. The senior rolled around the left side of the Warwick net but was shoved toward the crease by a Warriors player. The push sent Kunst airborne through the crease, where he controlled the ball before firing a shot past Warwick keeper Dakota Maurer before hitting the ground.
The score was upheld by the officials — Kunst was forced into the crease and, since he scored in that situation before landing, the shot counted.
“That’s just a good athlete making a good play,” Kidder said.
That goal gave Carlisle some breathing room heading into the second quarter, but more importantly it provided the Thundering Herd with the margin they took the distance. The home team never allowed the Warriors to tie the contest. Kunst countered an Ian Schmid goal in the opening minute of the second quarter with his second score of the evening, rushing through the left side of the Warwick defense and scoring unassisted 5:06 before the half.
The Warriors tacked on two unassisted goals in the third quarter — by Zak Shelley and Alex Gibbell, respectively — but they sandwiched Getz’s second score of the evening on an unassisted shot.
Kidder credited his team’s ability to stay ahead to his veteran defensive squad, headed by starting seniors Joel Miller and Sebastian Redcay along with sophomore Bryce Clonch, which held a desperate Warwick side to just three shots in the fourth quarter and one man-advantage shot on goal through all 2:30 of Carlisle’s penalty minutes.
“We have a good position defense,” Kidder said. “You play defense with your feet, not your stick. Their attackmen, one scored on a broken play and that was it.
“I have a senior defense out there, they’d better be good.”
Still, Warwick did some damage when given a man advantage. The Warriors scored their first-quarter goal with a man up and opened the second half with a goal just seconds after losing their man advantage. The Carlisle player was hardly on the field before Shelley ripped one into the Thundering Herd net to bring Warwick within one goal.
Thanks to Getz’s second score, however, Carlisle stayed ahead and sealed the victory in the final three minutes of play. Two minutes and 19 seconds before the final horn, the Thundering Herd’s Elliot Metzger passed the ball behind the Warwick net to teammate Daniel Bolan, who — while falling backwards — relayed it in front of the goal to Gilroy. The latter ripped a shot past Maurer and pulled his team ahead 6-4 with little time left for a reprisal.
The Warriors tried to make a late-game push, but the Thundering Herd defense squelched the effort and prevented any last-minute shots on goal.
“This is the third year in a row we’ve come up here, we always expect to see a physical team that has a big, strong defense,” Schmehl said. “It’s been one- or two-goal games the last two years.”
Warwick had previously won the last two meetings, defeating Carlisle in the postseason two years ago and winning a regular-season contest last year.
Though the Thundering Herd dropped their first game of the young season to Penn Manor, back-to-back victories have since given Kidder confidence that his team has turned things around.
“In scrimmages, they were doing well. Then we regressed in the Penn Manor game,” Kidder said. “We weren’t playing the style we were accustomed to.
“These last two games, we’ve played up to potential.”
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