The U.S. Men’s U19 Lacrosse team now self-admits it was being selfish on offense, uncommunicative on defense and not up to par between the lines, turned around its fortunes after a pair of pool play losses to the Iroquois Nationals and Canada earlier in the tournament.
Team USA avenged each of those defeats – the first two for any U.S. U19 team since sanctioned U19 international competition began – in the medal rounds, downing the Iroquois in the semifinals, followed by a 10-8 win over Canada in front of a capacity crowd of 1,200 on Saturday.
“It was quite an effort,” Team USA coach Tim Flynn said. “We had a little phrase after the game, ‘From the outhouse to the penthouse.’ They became a family off the field. They learned how to play well together. They really put everything together in the last two games.”
Like it did in the semifinal win Thursday, the U.S. dominated the middle of the field in the championship, winning 17 of 22 faceoffs as a team. Charlie Raffa won 10 and Tyler Barbarich seven while attackman Matt Kavanagh, named tournament MVP after finishing the competition with 19 goals and 15 assists (4.85 points per game), scored two goals and had two assists in the final. The defense held Canada scoreless during the second quarter, in which the U.S. scored four times to go ahead 6-2 while winning 7 of 8 draws.
For more: http://www.laxmagazine.com/teamusa/u19men/2011-12/news/072112_us_u19_men_rebound_to_win_world_title
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