The Dartmouth Sports Weekly 03/30/15

Page 1

3. 30. 15

LACROSSE WINS 3 OF 4 OVER SPRING BREAK

BASKETBALL FALLS TO CANISIUS IN CIT

SKIING PLACES SIXTH AT NCAA CHAMPIONSHIPS FAIZAN KANJI, JOSH RENAUD, TRACY WANG/THE DARTMOUTH STAFF


THE DARTMOUTH SPORTS WEEKLY

SW 2

BY THE NUMBERS

25:09.1 First place time of Patrick Caldwell ’17 in 10K NCAA Freestyle

11 Runners in the nation who finished ahead of Dana Giordano ’16 in the 3000M

0 Hits allowed by Kristen Rumley ’15 against Columbia University

2 Overtimes in the men’s lacrosse win over Harvard University

Men’s lacrosse jumps out to best start since 2011 B y emily wechsler The Dartmouth Staff

Unlike previous years, when the men’s lacrosse team travelled during the spring interim period, first-year head coach Brendan Callahan continued to work with the team in Hanover this past week. With this new approach, Callahan led the men to two home wins — a 12-11 double-overtime battle in the Ivy opener against Harvard University and a 16-15 tug-of-war against out-of-conference rival University of Vermont — before the Big Green ended a three-game win streak with an 8-2 loss on the road at Cornell University this past Saturday. “It was great for us, where we’re at right now, to spend a bunch of time working [and] practicing without having to worry about the travel,” Callahan said. “The guys got to work hard, spend a lot of time together… I think that was probably the biggest thing about having success over the break.” After the Harvard contest, two Big Green athletes earned recognition for their play, including captain Philip Hession ’15, who was named Ivy League Co-Player of the Week and Epoch/ Lacrosse Magazine Player of the Week. Jack Korzelius ’18 also earned Ivy League Rookie of the Week, Corvias ECAC Player of the Week and Northeast Credit Union Athlete of the Week honors for slotting the game-winner in overtime. Halfway through its season, the Big Green (3-4, 1-1 Ivy) has already built on its 2013-2014 season in which it claimed only two victories, with none in its conference. If the program wants to turn around last year’s record, it is important that the team atmosphere is positive and conducive to growth. Hession and other team leaders have been working to create this culture, and the results suggest success. “[The players] have started to believe in themselves and this group, that they can, if they play hard and play together, do some good things,” Callahan said. This newfound confidence, Callahan said, may be the team’s most important take-away from the interim period. The team, particularly its offense, is young with underclassmen taking three of the top four spots on the team

Katie McKay ’16 Editor-in-Chief

03. 30. 15

MONDAY, MARCH 30, 2015

Jessica Avitabile ’16 Executive Editor

Henry Arndt ’16 Joe Clyne ’16 Sports Editors

Julietta Gervase ’16 Photography Editor

Justin Levine ’16 Publisher

Luke McCann ’16 Executive Editor

JOSH RENAUD/THE DARTMOUTH STAFF

The men’s lacrosse team won three one-goal games over the spring interim, including a double-overtime over Harvard University.

for points. The program graduated its play-caller at the X last year and has dipped into its younger talent to find the new quarterback. The new faces, guided by a new coaching staff, need to — and seem to — take every game as an opportunity to learn in order to stay competitive. “We’re very process oriented, just trying to get better every week,” Hession said. “But we find out sort of where we’re at in that process each game.” Wiley Osborne ’17, who leads the team with 17 points, began his collegiate career last year as a scoring threat, marking 10 goals and tying for second on the team. This season, Osborne has been asked to change his identity and step into the X position. In his new role, Osborne serves primarily as a playmaker and has tallied 10 assists, seven more than any other player on the team. When Osborne is not setting up Adam Fishman ’15 or Korzelius, he’s putting the ball in the net himself and is on pace to score double-digit goals this season with seven so far. “The coaches have done a great job preparing me for what I need to do and helping me learn as we go,” Osborne said. “I like handling the ball and I feel comfortable with it in my stick, so I feel good about the new role I’ve taken on this year.” Osborne said upperclassmen have also been able to give him advice, and even more importantly they’ve demonstrated their confidence in him, trusting him with the ball and the reins on offense. This confidence — in each other and in themselves — is making a difference for the Big Green. The effect of this belief is visible in Korzelius, who netted game-winners against both Harvard and Vermont. “In the Harvard game, he comes down in overtime and takes a shot that was an easy save for the goalie,” Cal-

lahan pointed out. “To turn around the next possession or two possessions later and have the guts to take a shot again in that situation and score is unbelievable for a freshman.” Korzelius is certainly an early standout, but despite being the team leader in goals scored, Callahan said that so far he has remained a “hard-working, humble kid ­­— the type of guy you want to coach.” “I think he’s got a chance to be very good over his career if he keeps working and has the same attitude that he has right now,” Callahan said. The results from the first half of the season demonstrate that the team is clicking. The men had four one-goal games in a row, losing the first at the buzzer 9-10 to Sacred Heart University on March 4. After that loss the players worked hard to improve their lacrosse and their mentalities, following Callahan’s advice to always “keep swingin’.” It’s become a catchphrase for the team, and it appears to be working, leading the team to scrape out wins in the following three matches. “There were a couple little things, plays that were in our control that we didn’t make,” Callahan said of the Sacred Heart loss. “We kind of focused on those and started to figure those out for the Wagner [College] game, and then as the competition got better [we focused on] how to overcome each of those things that was holding us back.” Callahan said that the team’s ability to identify, attack and overcome a problem is “really special for me as a coach to see.” It will certainly serve them well moving forward in the season. In addition to improving on last year’s record, it’s clear that the team has made progress since the beginning of the season, when it lost its first match to Ohio State University by a score of 15-5. Cornell — currently seventh-

ranked nationally and likely a stronger team than Ohio State — topped the Big Green by only six points. Were it not for a few breakdowns, Hession said, the final score could have been even closer. Yet, the team has areas in which it can still improve. Its clear percentage of .769 is lower than the .833 clear average of its opponents and botched clears have hurt the Big Green in several recent games. Ball security has been another issue for the team, as the men have turned the ball over 123 times, compared to the 107 turnovers they have forced. “What we found today in the Cornell game is we haven’t gotten good enough, basically,” Hession said. “We want to get where we can go out there and just play a good game and still have a chance to win.” Other statistics for the team are more balanced. Crucial numbers such as ground balls — 199 for the Big Green and 206 for opponents — and faceoff percentage — .512 opposed to .488 for opponents — have carried the team thus far. The team can thank Hession and Robert Osgood ’15 for the faceoff and ground ball numbers, as Callahan said both have been giving outstanding performances in these areas respectively. The program didn’t have a lot of success last year, bringing the team’s confidence down, but Callahan hopes that with a few wins under their belts the program can start making “strides forward.” He said the main goal this season is to make the Ivy League tournament, in which the top four teams in the Ivy League compete. “We can keep it close with a top team, we can do it with just about anyone,” Osborne said. “I expect us to get more than a few more wins.” The team will be looking at film of the Cornell game before they move on to prepare for another crucial Ivy game at Yale University on Saturday at 3 p.m.


MONDAY, MARCH 30, 2015

THE DARTMOUTH SPORTS WEEKLY

Caldwell leads skiing to sixth at NCAAs B y Kourtney Kawano The Dartmouth Staff

To close the 2015 carnival season, 10 members of the ski team competed in the National Collegiate Men’s and Women’s Skiing Championships held on March 11-14 at Lake Placid, New York. After four days of competition, Dartmouth finished in sixth with 275 points, while the Big Green’s Eastern Conference rival University of Vermont placed fourth with 443 points. The Western region schools showed their dominance as the University of Colorado at Boulder earned its 20th national title with 505 points, and the University of Denver and the University of Utah placed second and third, respectively. The men and women’s Nordic freestyle opened the championships at Mt. Van Hoevenberg. The men’s Nordic squad gave an outstanding performance in the 10K freestyle as Patrick Caldwell ’17 won the individual title and earned first-team All-America honors in the event with a course time of 25:09.1 to defeat the Denver Pioneers’ Moritz Madlener by 2.2 seconds. Madlener was the first to start the race while Caldwell was the last in the field of 40 competitors. Before Caldwell began, the closest competitors to Madlener’s first-lap time of 12:14.0 were Colorado’s Rune Malo Oedegaard and Mads Ek Stroem. Caldwell, though, managed to surpass Madlener’s firstlap time by eight seconds and narrowly beat his overall time when he reached the finish line. Silas Talbot ’15 earned second-team AllAmerica honors with his eighth-place finish in 26:24.2. Fabian Stocek ’17 completed the course in 27:10.7 for 24th-place, giving the men 70 points total and a second-place finish in the event. On the women’s side, Corey Stock ’16 completed the 5K freestyle course in 15:16.4 for 13th place, and the Big Green ended the day with 88 points. With first and second-place overall finishes in the men and women’s Nordic freestyle, Colorado took a convincing lead from the start with 155 points. On the second day, the alpine teams took to Whiteface Mountain for the giant slalom races. Lizzie Kistler ’16 earned second-team All-America honors with her eighth-place finish in the event with a combined time of 2:25.30. Knowing she wanted to improve upon her 10th-fastest first-run time of 1:12.93, Kistler delivered a faster second run to improve her final placing and score 23 points for the team. Despite their success earlier in the season, Libby Gibson ’18 and Foreste Peterson ’18 had trouble completing the race as both fell during their first runs. “Everyone was excited to ski well on the big stage,” women’s alpine head coach Chip Knight said. “So there were surely some nerves that contributed to our performances.” The University of New Mexico’s Mateja Robnik won the event in 2:22.56, and the University of Denver’s Monica Huebner and Kristine Haugen placed second and third to give the Pioneers the top finish in the women’s giant slalom with 71 points. In the men’s giant slalom, three competitors scored a collective 49 points for the Big Green. Dylan Brooks ’17 led the Big Green with second-team All-America honors for his 10th-place finish in 2:19.38. Kevyn Read ’18

SW 3

THE

RUNDOWN Baseball

TRACY WANG/THE DARTMOUTH SENIOR STAFF

Patrick Caldwell ’17 led a number of standout Dartmouth skiers to place sixth at NCAAs.

and Ben Morse ’14 placed 13th and 22nd, respectively. Competing at Whiteface during NCAA Regionals, Brooks said, was a huge advantage and confidence booster heading into the NCAA Championships. “While we compete all season long against other Eastern schools, it is always interesting to see how you stack up against the Western guys you haven’t competed against all season,” Brooks said. Middlebury College’s Robert Cone and Christopher McKenna placed first and third respectively for a combined score of 74 points to give the Panthers a win in the event. The University of Utah pulled ahead of Colorado by the end of the second day with 241 points, leading the Buffaloes by four points heading into the third day. After a successful start on the first day, the Big Green Nordic teams took to Mt. Van Hoevenberg once again for the classic races, hoping to add to their score of 159 points. In the women’s 15K classic, Stock placed 20th with a time of 50:42.8 after holding off a last minute push by the University of Vermont’s Stephanie Kirk to finish ahead of her by one hundredth of a second. New Mexico’s Emilie Cedervaern won the race with a time of 47:40.3, and Utah’s Veronika Mayerhoffer placed second to add to the Utes’ 87 points in the event. Caldwell led the men’s Nordic team in the 20K classic with a 10th-place finish in 57:05.02 for second-team All-America honors. Talbot completed the course shortly after in 57:15.0 for 12th place, and Stocek finished in 17th place to give the Big Green 54 points in the event, bringing the Big Green’s score to 224 points at the end of the third day, putting them in sixth overall. Northern Michigan University won the men’s 20K classic with 85 points after its three skiers placed in the top 15. The men’s alpine team opened the final day of the NCAA Championships with a third-place finish in the slalom after placing all three Big Green skiers within the top 20. Read placed 11th with a combined time of 1:58.72, while Morse and Brooks finished in 14th and 17th, respectively, giving the Big Green 51 points in the event. One of the challenges for the skiers, men’s alpine head coach Peter Dodge said, is knowing that everyone’s score counts. “This along with the higher level of

competition often pushes the skiers to try to do something extra or to feel the pressure,” Dodge said. “I was pleased with the men’s alpine team’s performance.” Vermont’s Dominique Garand won the event in 1:55.03 after posting the secondfastest times in both runs. Denver’s Trevor Philp placed second in slalom for the second year in a row with a time of 1:55.20 to beat his teammate Espen Lysdahl who was unable to repeat as the national champion in the event and settled for third place. The women’s alpine team faced unfortunate circumstances in the slalom, as none of the skiers were able to complete their runs. Gibson and Kistler fell during their first runs, and Peterson fell in her second run after posting the seventh-fastest first-run time of 59.12 seconds. The team, Knight said, was dealing with ongoing injuries after all the hard falls they took in the giant slalom. “However, all of that is typical for a championship race at the end of the season,” Knight said. “Our team will learn and grow from this experience.” Denver’s Monica Huebner won the event with a combined time of 1:56.52, and Vermont’s Kristina Riis-Johannessen, the 2014 national champion, placed second to help the Catamounts to a first-place finish in the event with 87 points over Denver’s 86 points. Despite a solid showing in the slalom races by Denver, last year’s national champions, Colorado had just enough cushion from the team’s performances in the earlier days to stave off the Pioneers. The Big Green retained its sixth-place spot at the end of the championship despite earning zero points in the women’s slalom. Still, New Mexico, who placed fifth, outscored the Big Green 402-275. Although the 2015 skiing season has just ended, the Big Green ski team is already looking forward to the 2016 season and addressing the necessary issues to ensure another strong performance in the Eastern Regional Conference as well as the NCAA Championships. “As a team we had a very strong season,” Brooks said. “But as with every competitive athlete, you always want to perform better.” Learning to balance the academic load amidst the athletic demands in skiing, Knight said, will be an important step going forward.

SCHOOL

IVY

OVERALL

CORNELL COLUMBIA BROWN DARTMOUTH PENN PRINCETON HARVARD YALE

2-0 2-1 1-1 2-2 1-1 1-1 0-1 0-2

5-11 10-10 5-13 4-16 5-9 4-15 10-9 6-8

IVY

OVERALL

2-0 3-1 2-1 2-2 1-1 1-2 1-3 1-3

9-13 10-13 10-9 5-10 4-8 8-14 6-10 4-15

Softball SCHOOL

PRINCETON DARTMOUTH PENN CORNELL YALE HARVARD BROWN COLUMBIA

Men’s Lacrosse SCHOOL

IVY

OVERALL

CORNELL BROWN PRINCETON DARTMOUTH YALE HARVARD PENN

3-0 2-0 2-1 1-1 1-2 0-2 0-3

7-2 8-1 6-2 3-4 6-2 4-5 3-6

Women’s Lacrosse SCHOOL

IVY

OVERALL

CORNELL PENN PRINCETON HARVARD YALE COLUMBIA DARTMOUTH BROWN

3-0 2-0 2-0 1-1 1-2 1-2 0-2 0-3

7-2 8-1 7-2 3-4 6-5 4-5 0-8 5-3

Women’s Tennis SCHOOL

IVY

OVERALL

CORNELL PRINCETON DARTMOUTH HARVARD BROWN YALE COLUMBIA PENN

1-0 1-0 0-0 0-0 0-0 0-0 0-1 0-1

7-5 7-7 13-3 7-5 7-6 4-7 8-6 6-5


THE DARTMOUTH SPORTS WEEKLY

SW 4

ONE

ON

ONE

WITH JACK KORZELIUS ’18

B y katie jarrett The Dartmouth Senior Staff

This week, I talked with men’s lacrosse player Jack Korzelius ’18. Korzelius has already made a impact in the beginning of the season, being named the Ivy League Rookie of the Week, Covias ECAC Player of the Week and Northeast Credit Union Player of the Week. Korzelius also netted the game-winning goals for the Big Green against Harvard University in overtime last week and the team’s win against the University of Vermont. What are some of the keys to your early success? JK: It’s definitely with our new coach [Brendan Callahan], how hard he pushes us and the standards he sets for the team as a whole. When you work hard and set high standards, success comes early. How has it felt to receive so many accolades so early in your career?

JK: Couldn’t ask for a better ending than that. Second overtime came, and we knew the whole game was going to be a fight. Late in the second overtime, we were just working the ball around and Cam Lee [’16] dodged the backside and then got the ball back to me. I just took the ball and headed down the right alley. I got a step on my guy and just finished the ball. What are your thoughts on the season so far? JK: I think the season has gone very well. We had two big wins last week. In general, the team as a whole has done so much from the fall, just the way we attack each practice, lift and each play in general. The whole attitude of the program has changed, and that sometimes gets overlooked when people want to look at results. But results come from the values on the team, and that’s something that has changed big time. What are the team goals for the season?

JK: That stuff is nice along the way, but at the end of the day, you have a bigger goal than just a couple of “The whole awards. Is it challenging being a freshman and already having such a large role on the team?

JK: Definitely, we are looking to make the Ivy League tournament, which is something that we haven’t done in a attitude while. Once we’re of the program has there, we’re going to do our best to changed, and that bring home the sometimes gets championship.

overlooked when people want to look at results.”

What are your personal goals for the rest of the season?

JK: The guys - Jack Korzelius ’18 are very good JK: Just to basically about the freshkeep working hard men as a whole and put myself in as a group, and we’re all working to- a position where I can use my talents wards the same goal. So not really, no. to help the team in general moving forward. Have there been any adjustments in general to being a col- Did you every play anything lege athlete? other than lacrosse? JK: In general, the workload from high school to college is a big step. The sport itself is a lot faster, and on top of it, the work of an Ivy League school is definitely something else. Why did you choose Dartmouth? JK: Well, I love the school itself and its small, community-like feel, and I thought that we could really prove something in the Ivy League and save the program from where it was headed. Can you tell me a little about your game-winning shot against Harvard in the Ivy opener?

JK: In high school, I played two years of basketball, but that was it. What’s your favorite thing to do when you’re not playing lacrosse? JK: I’m a big movie guy, so I guess watch movies. Do you have any pregame rituals or superstitions? JK: Definitely regular things like retaping sticks, but since high school, I’ve been doing a pregame prayer. Other than that, that’s pretty much it.

MONDAY, MARCH 30, 2015

Basketball falls to Canisius 87-72 B y Ray Lu

The Dartmouth Staff

The men’s basketball team played its first postseason game in 56 years on March 18 in Buffalo, New York. The Big Green (14-15, 7-7 Ivy) fell to Canisius College (17-14) by a score of 87-72 in the first round of the CollegeInsider. com Tournament. “We were a little too slow in our defensive rotations to effectively contain Canisius tonight,” head coach Paul Cormier said during the postgame press conference. “Their athleticism gave us problems, and they were simply the better team tonight. This was a lesson for our players as we continue to build the program. While playing in the postseason was a terrific step for us, we still have a ways to go to get where we want to be.”​ In the final game of his collegiate career, co-captain Gabas Maldunas ’15 shot a perfect six-for-six from the field, finishing tied for team’s leading scorer with 15 points. Co-captain Alex Mitola ’16 matched Maldunas’ output with five three-pointers, joining Maldunas alongside the 27 Big Green athletes who have earned a place in the 1,000 point club in the process. Malik Gill ’16 was the third player in double-digits with 13. “We drove on a Tuesday, seven hours or so, to the game. Then we had the game the next day, so we came out kind of tired and stuff like that,” Maldunas said. “We weren’t really ready. The mentality wasn’t there to play the game.” A hotly contested match in the first half fell apart for the Big Green in the final three minutes of the first period. Mitola hit his third triple of the game — the basket that gave him the coveted 1,000-point milestone — to draw the game to a two-point Big Green deficit at 28-26 with 2:36 left in the first. After five lead changes in the first period, the Golden Griffins got hot just before the half and went on a 10-0 run off of 5-for-7 shooting to extend their lead to 38-26. Canisius took the momentum and double-digit lead into halftime and came out just as strong in the second, leading by double-digits for the majority of the remaining playtime. After falling behind 54-33 just over five minutes into the period — the largest deficit of the night — the Big Green rattled off an 11-0 spurt, led by threes from Miles Wright ’18 and Taylor Johnson ’18. Both players played a significant amount of time and finished with nine points each. After the Big Green cut the lead to 10 points at 56-46, Canisius responded with a seven-point run of its own, bringing the score to 63-46. Redshirt Canisius freshman Kassius Robertson finished the run of seven unanswered points with his second three pointer of the night. Characteristic of the team’s shooting streaks, the Big Green hit back-to-backto-back three pointers in response, two from Mitola and one from Gill. Again, Robertson came up big for the Golden

FAIZAN KANJI/THE DARTMOUTH STAFF

Gabas Maldunas ’15 ended his career with 15 points against Canisius College.

Griffins in the late game, swiping the ball before being fouled on the breakaway. He knocked down both his free throws, and the lead ballooned to 75-57 on another Robertson layup. Trying to capture some of the magic from its come-from-behind victories earlier in the season, the Big Green cut the deficit to single digits at 81-72 on a Johnson three with about a minute remaining in the game. This time, however, it was too little too late. Canisius junior Jamal Reynolds, who led all teams with 22 points, sealed the game with a pair of free throws, as the Big Green couldn’t connect from deep again. The Golden Griffins had five scorers in double-digits. Reynolds had a dominating game overall, finishing with an additional 10 rebounds and six assists, while shooting a near-perfect 12-for-13 from the line. The Big Green sought to live and die by the deep ball in the opening round playoff game, attempting 33 shots from downtown and making nine of them. The team shot 42.2 percent overall, just below their season average of 43.5 percent, but the Golden Griffins had a hot shooting night with 52.7 percent from the field and 84 percent from the line, where they went 21-for-25. The Golden Griffins advanced to the quarterfinals of the tournament, beating Bowling Green State University in the second round before falling to the New Jersey Institute of Technology. The tournament featured an experimental 30-second shot clock, leading to a high volume of shots. The playoff experience, however, will prove invaluable to the Big Green in the future. While the team will sorely miss both Maldunas and John Golden ’15, five juniors are currently on the roster playing significant minutes and show promise for the team to carry on its success next year. Several games from the team’s season this year, Golden said, made for a memorable experience playing for the College. “Coming back and beating Yale [University] at home, that was great.

Senior night to cap off a five-game win streak and finish at 0.500, that was great,” he said. “But even that whole end of the season stretch from coming back against Brown [University] to coming back against Yale was great. I thought we were a lot better than our record was, and at the end of the year we showed that a little bit.” In addition to the upperclassmen who are currently getting significant playing time on the roster, several underclassmen have made key contributions, including Ivy League Rookie of the Year Wright. The critical need will be to replenish the depth in the post to step up in Maldunas’s place. “[Wright] was Rookie of the Year, so that’s an easy thing to say. He’s a really good player,” he said. “The sophomores and freshmen, we played a lot of people down the stretch end of this year, so I think they got a lot of experience and should be able to build off of this year into next year.” The improvement of the men’s basketball team can be seen not only in its record, but also in its overall team cohesion. The team improved its overall record and brought its Ivy League record from 5-9 last year to 7-7 this year. The team aspect of the game, however, has really driven the men’s team forward. Previous squads have either found immense struggles on offense — no player averaged double-digit scoring from 2009-2011 before both Maldunas and Mitola did it in 2012 — or focused too heavily on one player — Alex Barnett ’09 averaged 19.4 points-per-game with no other player in the double digits. Cormier, who took over in 2010 after spending most of 12 years working in the NBA, is seeing his long rebuilding process pay off, recapturing some of the success he had during his first tenure at the College from 1984-1991. Two of those squads finished 10-4 in Ivy League play and just shy of the title both times. “Just the improvement of every year was a big highlight for me and the whole team,” Maldunas said. “All the improvement was a big highlight of my career, and to see the program get back on track was a great feeling.”


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