May. 12th, 2004 - Georgia Tech's Complete Game Shuts Down Missouri
Fenton, MO - Quarterbacking the #13 seeded SELC Champion Georgia Tech offense and leading all scorers with five assists, Freshman Attackman Ryan Wilkinson (Springfield, VA) delivered the Yellow Jackets their first MDIA Tournament victory over the #12 seeded Great Rivers Lacrosse Conference Champion University of Missouri Tigers, 12-4.
The Yellow Jackets were fired up early. Their offense was patient, selecting high percentage shots while their defense held Missouri scoreless for most of the first half. Wilkinson started strong, assisting on all three of Georgia Tech's first quarter goals with pinpoint accurate passing through defensive traffic.
"Assists are my job so I was keeping my head up," said Wilkinson. "The defense was sliding really quick today, so there were always open kids out there."
Georgia Tech's first goal came at 7:28, when Wilkinson maneuvered behind the cage, hitting senior midfielder Craig Kronenthal (Englishtown, NJ) at the top of the restraining box. Kronenthal fired a nifty shot low to beat Missouri goaltender Andy Milsark.
At 5:02 in the first quarter, an offsides call gave Georgia Tech the man-up opportunity and Wilkinson capitalized. Feeding a diagonal pass through the crease to a leaping Will Oakley (Wilmington, NC), the senior midfielder was able to bury the overhand shot before landing, putting the score at 2-0.
Wilkinson's final assist in the quarter came at 1:57, when he rifled a ball from the right wing through a jungle of sticks, and found Kronenthal again who quick-sticked the ball for his second goal of the game.
Asked what adjustments Missouri made to counter Wilkinson's hot hand, Head Coach Kyle Hawkins said "his team was more concerned with correcting their own mistakes before they could worry about what Georgia Tech was doing."
The Yellow Jackets continued their string of unanswered goals through the first part of the second quarter. Junior Attackman Sean Dvoran (Manhasset, NY) drove hard to the cage to score twice unassisted. Dvoran would finish with 3 goals on the day.
"I think the main thing is they were playing with a lot more heart and fire than we were," said Coach Hawkins. "We have not played high caliber games consistently. We can get up for a high caliber game when we need to, and we are learning what is necessary to bring it up to the next level."
With 8:32 left in the half, Missouri finally went on a run of their own. The Tigers scored three goals in six minutes to cut Georgia Tech's lead to 6-3. Senior Attackman Mike Brauss (St. Louis, MO) started it off, scoring one of the two goals he would finish the day with.
The Tigers' David Wolf (St. Louis, MO) collected the second goal at 5:01 in the second quarter, with the junior midfielder going airborne and blasting an overhand shot above his defender.
Great Rivers 1st Team All Conference midfielder Cole Dimond (Kansas City, MO) had the final goal of the Missouri run, shake and baking his defender to find space and rocketing the ball into the net.
With the Tigers showing signs of life, the Yellow Jackets looked for some reprieve from the deluge, and found it when Oakley scored his second goal of the game with just 1 second remaining in the half.
If a last second goal wasn't crushing enough for a Missouri squad heading into the half, Oakley returned in the third quarter and pumped in his final goal of the game at 14:33, a mere :28 seconds after closing the door on the Tigers' rally and giving Georgia Tech an 8-3 lead.
"We wanted to get our confidence back a little bit. We wanted to play a solid four quarters since yesterday we didn't accomplish that. Today was about getting back to basics," noted Georgia Tech Head Coach Ken Lovic after the contest.
The Jackets would only allow one more goal to Missouri, when Brauss stood knocking on the front door of the crease and slam-dunked a pass from behind the cage with 1:59 left in the third quarter.
"They came out firing," said Brauss. "We aren't used to being down early in games, and that played with our heads a little bit. We got kind of helter-skelter, just trying to put in goals. We couldn't run our offense effectively; we didn't possess the ball, looking for cutters. It just wasn't our game today."
Asked about what his young program was hoping to learn from their inaugural experience in the MDIA tournament, Lovic said "we wanted to take the complete game away with us. Everything from riding to face-offs. The little things we took for granted because the style of play in our conference is not the same as it is out West."
Georgia Tech will conclude the tournament on Friday morning in a consolation contest against Cal Poly while Missouri will take on another SELC team (Florida State).