Cortland Standard .net

By ALAN BUTLER
Sports Editor
Ready or not, here they come.
Though frigid winter conditions have hindered full-field preparations, the SUNY Cortland men’s lacrosse team will still be opening the season this Saturday traveling to Pennsylvania to take on Albright College at 1 p.m.
“There’s nothing you can do about it. You just make the best of every situation you can,” reasons head coach Steve Beville, who returns for his ninth season directing the perennial contenders for Division III national laurels. “Mother Nature is going to do what it does.”
What the Red Dragons do is win games, the Red Dragons repeating as undefeated SUNY Athletic Conference regular season and playoff champions last spring before a 17-4 campaign concluded with a 15-5 playoff loss to eventual national champion Tufts. That setback arrived in the NCAA Division III tournament’s quarterfinal round, and snapped a 12-game Cortland unbeaten streak.
Beville has 144 wins against just 22 losses during his Cortland tenure, including capturing a national title in 2009 campaign.
Cortland did venture to Long Island this past weekend to get in a scrimmage session with Division II Adelphi.
“We struggled at certain aspects of the game and probably had a few more turnovers than we liked, but the timing was off,” said Beville of that dress rehearsal. “But the guys were playing hard and we were physical.”
Opening day foe Albright is coached by Jake Plunket, the Cortland native who was a Red Dragon assistant coach under Beville after being a top midfielder at both Homer Central and Syracuse University.
Albright finished 13-6 a year ago led by a pair of brothers from Cortland High, as senior attackman Philip Potter topped the team with 28 goals and 21 assists while sophomore midfielder Andrew Potter had 20 goals and 13 assists as a Lions rookie.
Other locals on the Albright roster are Homer’s Cody Sandy, a senior defender who had 24 groundballs and forced seven turnovers last year, and Dryden’s Jordan Zehr, a sophomore who had a goal and two assists last year.
TOP TOP FOUR scorers off last year’s Cortland squad are back, led by senior attackman Zach Hopps who topped the team with 41 goals and 26 assists. Midfielder Matt Rakoczy (26 goals-19 assists), midfielder Mike Cantelli (19-21) and attackman Benjamin Dunlavey (29-7) are the other high scorers who are also senior team captains this season – along with veteran goalie Scott Tota and long-stick midfield standout Patrick Brown.
Sophomore James Stavrakis, who played two years ago as a freshman before sitting out a year, adds depth to the attack where upperclassmen Hopps, Dunlavey and Matt Savlov (13-3) are proven scorers. The Red Dragons averaged 12.23 goals per game in 2014.
Rakoczy and Cantelli head up a midfield group that also has lots of senior savvy with Homer Central graduate Hunter Osborne (5-1) and Billy Davis (2-1) around. Junior Ethan Printy, who arrived to Cortland from Monroe Community College, will be a nice midfield addition and sophomore D.J. deLyra is also looking to run with the first unit.
Davis also handles some faceoff responsibilities, though junior Pat Baldwin is the main man there after winning 162 of the 254 faceoffs he took a year ago. Junior Gino Prestigiacomo has also shown some skills at the faceoff X to add depth to that vital skill position.
CORTLAND’S DEFENSIVE middies will be a team strength, starting with the long-pole talents of West Genesee product Brown and fellow senior Dan Southard out of Onondaga. Short-stick defensive midfielders who have been a nuisance to opponents in the past include senior Luke McNaney from Marcellus, senior Dillon Giorgis, junior Dylan Sbarglia out of Rome Free Academy and junior Vermont native Abel Warden.
“That’s been the glue holding the ‘D’ together, that and having a fifth-year senior in Scott Tota in goal,” said Coach Beville of his slid defensive midfield groups.
Tota won 16 of the 20 games he started in goal for Cortland last year, and had a 7.05 goals against average while coming up with 185 saves.
How a brand new close defense works around Tota will be crucial to Cortland success. “We’ve had some guys laying in wait defensively to get the chance to show what they can do,” says Beville.
Sophomore David Foster, junior Joe Brand and junior Anthony Vaccaro are among those defenders eagerly looking to step up. Ryan Scarano is a transfer from Adelphi who should also play a vital role on defense. Freshmen Trevor Pratt and Dan Hurley have also looked good, Colorado native Pratt the son of former Homer Central and Syracuse University All-America defender Dan Pratt.
“The defense is a lot more physical than last year’s defense,” said Beville. “They’re going to be fine, they just need game time.”
FACING ALBRIGHT will be no easy task, though Cortland has not lost to the Lions in previous openers. “They’ve had a lot less than us,” said Beville of the bad weather, meaning the Lions have had more full-field workouts.
“Timing is the thing, and you’re spacing and your timing,” said Beville of the importance of being able to work on a regulation field. “Though we have a nice indoor facility (in Lusk Field House), it can’t simulate what you’re doing outside. There are a lot of subtle nuances that we haven’t had enough time to prepare.”
And Cortland’s early season schedule is tough.
After Albright, the Red Dragons will be traveling to Long Island to face Union Feb. 28 and taking on RIT inside Syracuse University’s Carrier Dome on March 11. Then comes a trip south to face Lynchburg and Stevenson on back-to-back March 20 and 21 days for the Stevenson Mustang Classic — with Beville expecting both of those opponents to be ranked atop the national polls.
“There are more quality teams every year,” said Beville, noting 230 schools now play Division III lacrosse. “It’s great to see there are more and more teams that are talented and more teams building depth. Albright is the perfect example. They keep getting better and better and they’re no gimme.”