Well, if the Rochester Rattlers objective to get into the playoffs wasn’t tricky before, it’s part of a Houdini act now.
In last night’s match-up, the game went in Denver’s favor 17-12. The Outlaws won every quarter except for the fourth, but by that time, it was a little too late for the Rattlers.
Steven Boyle started things off with a beautiful diving goal to give Rochester a one goal lead. A few minutes after that, Brad Ross and Jesse Schwartzman collided hard. Schwartzman went to clamp on the ball near midfield, but clamped right on top of Ross’ shoulder. He was down for a bit but came off on his own.
After everything got situated, Rob Rotanz took the ball down the alley and Schwartzman came up big. A clean transition for Denver led to a beautiful backside goal on the crease by Jordan McBride from Jeremy Sieverts to tie the game at one. Anthony Kelly won the ensuing faceoff and Terry Kimener went to the net unassisted on a shot that Rochester goalie John Galloway wishes he had back. Steve DeNapoli took things into his own hands. He got the groundball from the faceoff and scored unassisted and untested. After a string of possessions, Denver’s Brendan Mundorf got on the stats sheet. With a quick restart from X, Mundorf drove the back right side of the net and put one past Galloway with one second left on the shot clock.
Denver’s next goal came after an offside’s call on Rochester and the Outlaws Matt Bocklet scored off a pass from Justin Pennington. Rochester came right back to answer with Roy Lang running from midfield untested and unassisted, to bring the score to 4-3 Denver. Possession then went to Denver on an illegal procedure call on Rochester. Jeremy Sieverts assisted Peet Poillon on a worm burner from the top inside part of the two point arc, another goal that Galloway could have had. Drew Snider grabbed the ground ball off the face off and hit an open Kelly, tossed it to a cutting Matt Bocklet, who found his younger brother Chris Bocklet, back door-ing John Lade, and buried it in the back of the net. That would be it for the first quarter, Denver was leading 6-3.
At the start of the second quarter, Kelly won the face clean and started the fast break. Galloway came up big twice on the first shot and rebound shot. Rochester got the ball on the offensive end and settled. Ned Crotty got the ball behind and dodged from X, finding a wide open Kevin Leveille who put it in the net. On Denver’s next possession, after Rochester threw the ball away, Poillon had his name called again. Taking his defender down the alley and ending it with a spectacular dive and a goal.
There were a few turnovers from both teams and in that time Rochester got the first EMO of the night after a slash was called on Sieverts. Unfortunately, they didn’t score. After that, Sieverts collided with Joel White, and Mundorf got knocked down to the ground. That started the chippy portion of the game.
It wasn’t until the 5:21 mark that the next goal was scored. In a crowd up top on the two point arc, Poillon pulled the trigger to score the only games two point goal with another worm burner. Denver took a commanding 9-4 lead. More back and forth came up until Jordan MacIntosh found Leveille wide open once again. Kevin put the bouncer past Schwartzman and brought the Rattlers within four. The final goal of the second came off a misconception play as Mundorf tried passing it to Mark Matthews in front of the net, got stick checked and the ball floated past Galloway unexpectedly and into the net. The Outlaws took a 10-5 lead as well as an EMO into the half.
Rattlers won the faceoff to begin the third and killed off Denver’s EMO. Schwartzman came up big on the one on one save. When Denver got on offense, Poillon added another point as he got the ball to Matthews on the crease and got the goal.
Rochester had enough of Denver’s scoring and went on a three goal run, started by a MacIntosh goal after he was found open on the crease by Boyle. Striebel then drew the penalty from a Dillon Roy slash. He went on to assist on the EMO goal that was scored by Leveille. The third goal came from Boyle from up top on an assist from DeNapoli, making it 11-8 in Denver’s favor.
The Outlaws finally put the brakes on the Rattlers and pulled one better, going on a four goal run to finish out the third quarter. However, before that happened, there was a little pushing and shoving going on in front of the Denver bench between Roy, White and Leveille.
All three were hit with unsportsmanlike conduct, putting Rochester down two and Denver only one man down. Denver was awarded a man up situation. The first goal came when Matthews found McBride on the opposite side of the crease. Matthews was the goal scorer on the next one with an assist from Mundorf. Snider started the fast break, got the ball back from Matthews and hit the back of the net for another man up goal.
Penalties were released and Denver gained possession after, once again, a back and forth segment of lacrosse. While on offense, Mundorf had gone down after grabbing his hamstring and play was stopped. Luckily it was only a cramp.
The final goal of the quarter included Kimener. He got the mismatch up top and went to the cage and scored an unassisted goal. At the end of the third, the Outlaws were up 15-8.
Striebel scored a two point goal, but it was taken away because of a shot clock violation. However, DeNapoli gave Rochester hope as he scored his second of the night. Leveille passed it to Steve, who went one on one with Schwartzman and it ended in a flying DeNapoli goal. Rotanz finally got himself on the score board after he picked up a ground ball off a Leveille shot, dodged East to West on his defender and curled to the net.
Mundorf re-entered the game in the fourth. He put the cramp to bed and put the ball in the back of the net after a circus of a play on the EMO after Mike Manley was called for a slash. His first shot got saved by Galloway, but Brendan retracted the rebound and said not happening twice John.
Kevin Drew put a goal in for Rochester unassisted with five minutes remaining to make it 16-11 Outlaws. Lee Zink was hit with a slashing penalty when he nailed Crotty right on the chest, ouch.
On the EMO, Boyle restarted quickly after chasing a shot, hit Crotty who found Leveille on the door step and he put it home with three minutes to go.
With that goal, Kevin Leveille moved up to second on the All-Time MLL Scoring list.Congratulations to Mr. Leveille.
Denver added another goal to the score board. Poillon again was the mastermind behind this one, starting from midfield, beating DeNapoli and then beating Galloway with a few fakes. That was all she wrote from Rochester, as the Rattlers fell to the Outlaws 17-12.
Big factor of the game was Ned Crotty. Besides his two assists, he was ineffective. Along with the unsportsmanlike conduct penalties that put Rochester down two men and Denver only one. Full time penalties can do tremendous damage on a team’s defense, both physically and on the score board.
Transition and possession were also part of the reason as to why Rochester lost. Giving Denver the ball is never a good idea and turning it over just makes the game easier for the Outlaws. Don’t get me wrong, Denver had their fair share of turnovers, but the difference between these two teams last night was that the Outlaws took advantage of the opportunities and finished.
The faceoff’s were not as big of a factor as I thought they would have been. The two player system worked for the Rattlers as Craig Bunker and Bobby Dattilo went for a combined 15-32 and Anthony Kelly went 16-30 with Dillon Roy going 1-2 for an overall 17-32. Although, one on one versus Kelly, Dattilo or Bunker don’t really stand a chance.
With Boston winning and the Rattlers losing last night, Rochester is going to need a lot of help from Ohio and Charlotte next weekend. They need the Machine to come out swinging and the Hounds to completely fall apart.
Rochester will need a win and a Boston loss this weekend as they visit the Charlotte Hounds, who are coming off a win against the Hamilton Nationals. Both teams want to go out on top. Look for Charlotte to hold no prisoners and try to spoil the Rattlers playoff dreams.
Denver is currently on a five game winning streak and travels to Annapolis to take on the Chesapeake Bayhawks. This will be a game to watch as it will hold two post-season contenders and be a preview for the 2012 playoffs.
This weekend is the last for the 2012 regular season, and it wouldn’t be Major League Lacrosse without a little postseason drama.
