Brendan Curry ran horizontally across the top of the offensive zone late in the fourth quarter and let a long shot go. Unlike most of the afternoon, this shot stayed down and punched the top right corner of the Army cage. It provided an insurance goal as SU (3-0) extended its lead to 9-7, a score that would hold until the final buzzer against No. 9 Army (3-2) on Sunday afternoon. The Orange didn’t hold their first lead until the 5:46 mark in the fourth quarter, but with career-best performances from Drake Porter and Jamie Trimboli, SU avoided an upset and stayed undefeated.

Here are three takeaways from the game.  

Brick wall

Army’s Nickolas Edinger caught a pass in front of the net and turned to face SU goalie Drake Porter one-on-one. He faked high a couple of times before trying to squeeze it through Porter’s five-hole. But Porter got down with his stick to stop it like he had the entire game. The senior goalie made nine saves in the first quarter alone for Syracuse and finished with a career-high 18. 

Porter’s play in the first half limited Army to five goals on 17 shots. With Syracuse’s offense unable to get going until the start of the second half, Porter kept the Army lead manageable. The Black Knights had multiple chances one-on-one against Porter in front of the cage when Syracuse slid. He was only beat once in the first half in those situations, when Miles Silva shot high instead of faking. 

After Jamie Trimboli’s first goal in the second half, Army came down and took a long shot on Porter. He saved it, and 39 seconds later, Trimboli was down at the other end putting the ball in the back of the net. The next Army possession, the sequence repeated — this time taking only 16 seconds for Trimboli to score. With Porter as their anchor, the Orange launched their comeback. 

Shooting woes continue

New offensive coordinator Pat March noted SU’s shooting percentage struggles through its first two games. The Orange came into Sunday ranked 26th nationally at 31.7%. That was well off other Atlantic Coast Conference teams like North Carolina and Notre Dame, which are both above 36%. In the first half against Army, the poor shooting continued, and SU scored just twice on 18 shots. 

Some of that resulted from where the Army defense forced shots from. Syracuse got too close to the goalie at times, and with the Orange coming from the side of the net Army goalie Wyatt Schupler easily closed the angle. But many shots went high and wide. Griffin Cook had one chance when he was open backside but took it behind-the-back and missed the cage entirely. Syracuse also didn’t get as many chances as it did against Colgate and Binghamton, averaging 60 shots across those two games. Army limited the Orange to 47 shots on Sunday afternoon.   

Trimboli Treble

Syracuse badly needed a spark of offense to start the second half, and Trimboli delivered. Thirty seconds into the third quarter, Trimboli cut the Army lead to two goals when Brendan Curry found him in the middle of the offensive zone with a sliver of space. Then Curry tried a similar feed to Stephen Rehfuss but missed the pass. But Trimboli was shadowing the Rehfuss backdoor cut and caught the pass and shot low right past the Army goalie. To cap off a third-quarter hat trick in under five minutes, Trimboli had an unassisted effort where he dodged from the wing and shot in a similar location to beat the goalie. 

On an afternoon the rest of his teammates shot high and wide and struggled to find space against a suffocating Army defense, Trimboli ended with five goals on seven shots and led a Syracuse comeback to avoid an early season upset and earn its first top-ten win of the year.

Published on February 23, 2020 at 3:20 pm

Contact Arabdho: armajumd@syr.edu | @aromajumder