Desko gets 200 in Orange Win over In-State Rival Cornell

Story and Photo By Robin Deehan

SYRACUSE, N.Y. – In the 100^th meeting between New York powerhouse rivals, SU head coach John Desko picked up his 200^th career win as No. 4 Syracuse steamrolled No. 10 Cornell 14-6 Sunday afternoon.

In his 17 seasons at the helm of the men’s lacrosse program Desko holds an overall record of 200-63.

“It’s great, I’d like to be here for 300,” Desko said.  “I hadn’t really thought about it going into the game, I’ve been here and I’ve worked with Roy Simmons Jr. for 19 years and when he retired I obviously took over for him and it's great to still see him in the stands. I knew his dad very well, Roy Simmons Sr., so it's great to be in the ballpark with guys like that.”

Desko is the ninth Division I coach and third Syracuse coach to reach 200-wins, joining Orange legends Roy Simmons Jr. (290 wins) and Roy Simmons Sr. (253 wins).

Syracuse is the first Division I program in history with three 200-win coaches.

First Half Hits

Despite the wind chill making it feel like negative 24 degrees outside, 4,127 Orange and Big Red fans came out to the Carrier Dome to watch the early season top 10 match up.

“You don’t get an opportunity to get a top 10 win that often this early in the season, especially with the type of schedule we have with the ACC and some of our traditional rivals like Hopkins,” SU attacker Kevin Rice said.  “We know we are probably going to take some lumps later on in the year and this is a nice one to put on the resume and take advantage of moving forward.”

After a slow but intense first ten minutes of play that treated the crowd to two big hits that could be heard from the last row of the Carrier Dome, the Orange finally struck when Randy Staats took a quick shot off a four-pass swing sequence with 3:58 left in the first quarter.

At the start of the second quarter, Cornell’s John Edmonds was called for interference giving SU the man-up advantage, which SU quickly acted on when Rice found Dylan Donahue for a 2-0 lead.

Edmonds wouldn’t give up that easily though, after being released from the penalty he came back in to score an unassisted goal getting Cornell on the board for the first time all day.

Unfortunately for Cornell, that was the closest it would come to the Orange.

Less than a minute after Edmonds goal, Syracuse began a 4-0 run to close out the first half at 6-1, including back-to-back goals from Nicky Galasso and Rice just 12 seconds apart.

“It just took us a little while to adjust and go back to our offensive roots,” Rice said. “I thought we did that, and our midfielders played well late in the first quarter and early in the second quarter and that helped open it up for us.”

Second Half Dominance

SU came out hot in the second half scoring just 22 seconds into the third quarter on a bullet from Derek DeJoe.

Cornell’s best chance for a rally happened just 44 seconds later when Connor Buczek and Bradlee Lord scored just 19 seconds apart to bring the Big Red within four.

But Cornell’s defense was no match for SU’s offensive unit who saw goals from six different Orangemen in the third quarter, including SU faceoff specialist Ben Williams who drove down from midfield to score unassisted putting the Orange up 12-4.

Hakeem Lecky and Rice would score the 13^th and 14^th team goals, both unassisted, to round out SU’s offensive play.

Cornell’s final two looks at the goal came at the end of the fourth quarter when Cornell tried to roll one past the line after a scramble that saw SU keeper Bobby Wardwell out of the cage, but defender Brandon Mullins made an outstanding diving save to stone the Big Red.

“That play was just kind of chaos,” Mullins said. “I saw they kind of tried to tip the ball in the goal and I just dove to try to stop it and it didn’t go in so that was good.”

Buczek scored the final goal of the game, unassisted, with just under 2:00 left to play to cement the final score at 14-6.

Buczek finished with a hat trick and Cornell keeper Christian Knight finished with 13 saves.

Orange Scoring

Seven different Orange men found the back of the cage Sunday.

“There’s a bunch of goal scorers and a bunch of guys with assists and I think that’s good,” Rice said.  “It makes it harder for teams to focus on one area or one individual player and if they do, we have other guys who can step up.”

Staats and Lecky both recorded a hat trick while Donahue, Nicky Galasso and Rice each had a pair.

Williams and DeJoe also chipped in with one apiece.

The Syracuse defense, lead by Mullins, also had a banner day forcing 10 of Cornell’s 16 turnovers.

“It was firing us up on offense,” Rice said. “We were a little slow getting things going, it was 1-0 late in the first quarter and they’re [the defense] hitting people and they’re forcing turnovers and pushing the ball up the field.  It gets the Dome going, it gets the crowd going, and it gives us that confidence that we’re still in it, and they got our backs even if we’re starting a little slow.”

SU keeper Bobby Wardwell recorded 10 saves and Warren Hill had two of his own as SU improved to 2-0 on the season and Cornell dropped to 0-1.

Up Next

The Orange men will host Army (3-0) Sunday Feb. 22 at 7 p.m.

This will be the 62^nd meeting between the two teams with Army leading the series 39-22.