COLLEGE LACROSSE
Date in Carrier Dome doesn’t faze Canisius
By Tom Borrelli
NEWS SPORTS REPORTER
Updated: 05/11/08 6:46 AM
Nick LoCoco’s family has had season tickets to Syracuse University lacrosse for 13 years.
Mark Leonard guesses that he’s probably been to more than 100 events — football, basketball and lacrosse — at the Carrier Dome.
Before Canisius College began varsity lacrosse in 1990, if Western New Yorkers wanted to see the sport played at the NCAA Division I level, they normally made the 150-mile trip east on the Thruway.
“I’ve been going to the dome for 20 years watching games,” said Leonard, a junior defense-man for the Golden Griffins who went to Westhill High School in Syracuse. “The first game I went to there was the Gaits’ last game there [in 1990]. I watched the Powells growing up. You dream of playing there. I wondered how I would ever get to that spot. And then when you finally get there you just say to yourself, ‘I’m on Cloud Nine.’ ”
The reward for the most successful season in Canisius lacrosse history is a date at 7:30 tonight (ESPNU, Radio 710 AM) against the third-seeded Orange in the first round of the NCAA Tournament.
“To go back home and play in the dome has always been a lifelong dream,” said LoCoco, a freshman attackman from Cicero-North Syracuse who is tied for second in the nation in assists with 33 and was recently named the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference’s top first-year player. “It’s going to be fun. There’s going to be a lot of relatives and friends there.”
The Griffs (10-6), who last week outscored Manhattan and Virginia Military Institute by a combined 25-7 in winning the first two playoff games in school history, realize what they’re up against in the Orange (12-2).
Before being left out of the big dance last year with a 5-8 record that was its first losing season since 1975, Syracuse had made 24 straight appearances in the NCAA Tournament, at one stretch reaching the final four 22 years in a row (1983-2004).
But the daunting task of facing a program that is 21-1 under the dome in NCAA Tournament games, 223-61 (78.5 percent) with six titles just since Canisius started lacrosse 18 years ago, and gunning for its 10th national championship isn’t taking away from the appreciation of a golden opportunity.
“It’s going to be a fantastic experience,” Griffs coach Randy Mearns said. “We’re going to the hallowed ground of lacrosse in the dome. Along with [Johns] Hopkins they’ve been the mainstays in the NCAA for about a quarter of a century now. So we are pretty pumped up about it.”
Though everyone in the lacrosse world acknowledges that the Griffs are a big underdog, it’s not like they’ll go into the game unprepared for their moment in the spotlight.
Canisius opened the regular season at six-time national champion Princeton, met NCAA Tournament invitees Cornell and Colgate, and hosted traditional power Hobart. Though the Griffs lost all those games, they met the same fate against Colgate as the Orange — a 12-11 defeat.
“We played Colgate and Princeton pretty tough,” said sophomore midfielder Tim Rowley (West Seneca West). “That’s a big help because now we know what caliber of team we’ll see with Syracuse. It’s very important to weather those first few minutes but I think we’re going to come out really strong.”
Syracuse is led by senior attackman Mike Leveille, who has been picked as one of five finalists for the Tewaaraton Trophy — presented to the nation’s top player.
Leveille ranks fifth nationally in points per game (4.57), eighth in goals (2.71) and ninth in assists (1.86). He leads the Orange in points (64), goals (38) and assists (26) and owns the nation’s second-longest scoring streak, having registered at least one point 53 straight games.
Canisius has plenty of punch, too. Freshman Adam Jones is tied for 13th in goals per game (2.47) with 37, including 10 hat tricks, and senior attackman Mike Blocho (Grand Island) has 115 career points, which ranks 11th in school history.
“I don’t follow Syracuse in any sport,” said Blocho, who was The News’ high school football player of the year as a running back in 2003. “If we come out strong in the first five or 10 minutes and show Syracuse that we’re not just there to roll over, they’ll realize they have to play a little harder. Then so will we and we’ll see how it ends up.”
