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Following Friday night’s 13-12 thriller in the Dome, Virginia stays on the road tomorrow with a rare in-state road game at VMI in Lexington. The game is set to begin at 3:30 pm on the Keydets’ Sprinturf Field, located behind Foster Stadium. This is believed to be the first time in 16 years VMI has hosted the No. 1 team in the nation.
The Keydets are 1-3 so far this season after falling to Bellarmine 14-6 last Saturday at home. Bellarmine scored six goals in the third quarter to break open a tight game and seize command.
Junior midfielder Tim Moran leads the team with four goals, while junior middie Brett Leonard and junior attack Jacob Weimer each have three; Weimer scored twice in last year’s game against Virginia. Junior Sean McCoy is in his third year as the starter in the cage. He has allowed an average of 12.38 goals per game, while recording a .448 save percentage.
Virginia has won 15 previous match-ups against the Keydets, including last year’s 24-5 win in a driving rainstorm at Klckner Stadium. The Cavaliers’ 11-10 win in the first game in 1949 is the closest of the series as the Cavaliers have won by an average of 18.0 goals.
The Cavaliers moved into the top spot in the coaches poll this week by virtue of the win over Syracuse; they were already No. 1 in the media poll.
Midfielder Shamel Bratton was named the Atlantic Coast Conference player of the week after scoring a career-high four goals and adding an assist to pace the offense against the Orange.
As one of the most dynamic players in the country, Bratton had the type of breakout game that Syracuse coach John Desko feared. During the early part of the season he was creating plenty of shots, but was having trouble getting any of them into the back of the net as his 13.8 percent shooting attested.
“He is an extremely talented player, he’s very athletic and very hard to cover,” Desko said after the game. “We knew that it was our worst fear. He creates a lot of opportunities for himself, and if he hits the cage, he becomes that much more dangerous.”
Bratton scored three of his four goals in the second half, as well as recording his assist, as Virginia turned a 4-all tie at halftime into a 13-8 margin midway through the fourth quarter.
The cushion was needed, as everybody in the Dome knew a big Syracuse run was bound to happen. And it did.
“One of the first things I told the team as we thought about playing Syracuse (in the Dome),” said Virginia head coach Dom Starsia, “was you need to play Syracuse for 60 minutes, that the game is not over till the final whistle blows.”
With the clock under five minutes, middie Dan Hardy got things started for the Orange. Attackman Kenny Nims scored back-to-back goals to cut the Cavaliers’ lead to two at 13-11 with 2:25 to play. Syracuse had a golden chance to draw closer following a penalty on Mike Timms and converted on Tim Desko’s only goal of the game with 78 seconds remaining.
Syracuse claimed the ensuing faceoff, only adding to the hysteria of the 16,595 fans screaming for the Orange to complete the comeback. With everybody thinking back to Syracuse’s comeback in the final four last year, Cavalier defender Matt Kelly turned in the play of the game. First he checked Nims’ stick preventing him from catching a pass from Tim Desko, then raced 25 yards to knock the ball from Scott Kahoe’s stick. Max Pomper snared the ground ball for Virginia, as the Cavaliers were able to run out the final 30 seconds and win.
“Matt Kelly made a great play on that last possession to keep that ball loose so Max Pomper could pick it up,” Starsia said, “and that’s how we ran it down and killed the clock to win the game. That was a real hustle play by Matt Kelly.”
QUICK STICKS
** Virginia is 15-0 all-time against VMI
** This is the first time since 1997 Virginia has played in Lexington; Virginia is 5-0 on the Keydets’ home turf
** The Cavaliers’ average victory margin in the series is 18.0 goals
** Based on available records going back to 1988, the Cavaliers have only trailed in one game (VMI scored the game’s first two goals and led for five minutes and 33 seconds in the 1994 meeting, a 22-7 Virginia win)
** Virginia has an 18-game winning streak going back to 2001 in reguiar-season midweek games
** Under head coach Dom Starsia, Virginia is 40-2 (.952) in mid-week games since 1993
** The Cavaliers’ win over Syracuse was the 290th of Starsia’s career, tying him with former Syracuse coach Roy Simmons, Jr., for fourth in Division I history
** Virginia has not trailed in any game this season
** Attack Garrett Billings leads the nation with 17 goals and 25 total points, and is tied for sixth (with teammate Danny Glading among others) with eight assists