Right on Kew — Swarm Snap 3-Game Skid with 13-12 OT Win Against Thunderbirds

The birds and the bees

“We talked about it in a timeout about how the ball doesn’t have to go through the mesh, it just has to hit the mesh.” Georgia Swarm (8-7) head coach Ed Comeau’s message to Andrew Kew delivered the biggest goal of the night, as Kew came around a Toron Eccleston pick in overtime and sniped the game-winning goal home on his twelfth shot on net, snapping the Swarm’s three-game losing skid with a 13-12 overtime victory against the Halifax Thunderbirds (9-6).

Fans came for a National Lacrosse League game on Sunday, March 30 at Gas South Arena and were instead treated to a track meet, as the Thunderbirds used their league-leading transition capabilities to run often with diminishing returns as the game went along. The Swarm were more than happy to outpace the run-and-gun visitors, controlling the game in the second half until the final seconds of regulation.

In the dying minute of the fourth quarter, the Thunderbirds were down 12-10 and had managed to kill off a minor penalty to Dawson Theede. Captain Cody Jamieson tucked a shortside shot at the 19-second mark to give his team 11 goals on the night, and after the penultimate Jake Withers’ face-off win, Theede rewarded his team for not allowing a goal against after his infraction by following up with an extra attacker goal of his own, his fourth marker on the night.

“There are so many one-goal games in our league,” Comeau said, “and for use, we’ve been on the wrong end of a few too many recently, so it felt great to get it. I’m proud of the guys. We had a two-goal lead, and they made some nice plays at the end, but we didn’t quit. We battled hard in overtime and got the big win.”

“I think there’s disappointment, obviously,” Thunderbirds head coach Mike Accursi diagnosed postgame. “We were bad in transition. We forced transition; we turned the ball over in transition. We had a 2-on-1 at the end of the game, all-time leading scorer, and we didn’t take a shot. It’s just decision-making was bad tonight, and they were good in transition, right? They scored five in tranny, and we were not good at all.”

Withers won his first of 25 face-off wins on the night to kick the final game of week 18 off, and his team failed to capitalize on an early power play opportunity. Georgia opened the scoring with a transition marker, a sign of things to come, as Seth Van Schepen used a jumping farside tuck at full spring to draw first blood.

Kew lasered his first goal home shortly afterwards, and the Thunderbirds fast break game got in a groove as the settled offense struggled to show up on time. Excellent reverse transition from the Swarm and strong goalie play from Brett Dobson stymied Halifax early, and immediately after their own power play expired, Miles Thompson scored with a quick stick to put the Swarm up 3-0. On the ensuing face-off, Withers scored off the draw to finally get the Thunderbirds on the board. Theede’s first of the game was delivered after a run off the bench, the first quarter ending with the visiting team down 3-2.

Kaleb Benedict squeezed his first goal of the game between Warren Hill’s closing ankles. Another power play opportunity led to the Swarm’s lone power play marker of the game, scored by Bryan Cole on his wrong side, putting the Swarm up 5-2.

An exceptional slip tripped up his defender on the next shift, and Jamieson scored the Thunderbirds’ first settled goal of the game. Hill battened down the hatches, making exceptional save after exceptional save on numerous high-danger Swarm shots. While he stood on his head, a transition marker from Colton Armstrong was followed up by Randy Staats’ game-tying tally. Theede gave Halifax their first lead of the night before Cole tied the game up a little over two minutes later. It seemed the teams would go to halftime tied at six apiece before Clarke Petterson’s success at scoring on the extra attacker with six seconds left in the half.

Lyle Thompson set off the second half scoring by drawing a penalty and crashing the crease for his lone tally of the game. Ryan Terefenko potted a transition tally, what would be the last success the Thunderbirds would see on fast breaks for the rest of the night, as their shots afterwards swung wide more often than on cage and decision making got poorer and poorer as the game waned.

“They’re dangerous in transition,” Comeau remarked. “Terefenko, like we said, he might be the fastest guy in our league. When he picks the ball up, there’s no one closing the gap on him; he’s creating separation.”

Georgia was more than happy to outrun their opponents, responding with a three-goal streak featuring two fast break goals from Adam Wiedemann and Benedict and a 4-on-4 tip-toeing jumper from Brendan Bomberry. Up 10-8, the Swarm ended the third quarter trying to kill as much of Wiedemann’s five-minute major penalty as they could.

They were successful at killing a significant stretch of Halifax’s man-advantage, but Theede’s hat trick early in the fourth quarter pulled the Thunderbirds back within one. After the rest of the penalty time expired, the teams went back to swapping transition opportunities, with Georgia taking advantage of its short bench. Jackson bookended a Halifax score with a pair of goals streaking off the bench, resulting in his team up 12-10.

Halifax found themselves man-down at the 2:22 min. mark courtesy of a Theede roughing penalty, but after they successfully killed it, two extra attacker goals scored 17 seconds apart forced overtime. The two teams went back and forth, with the Thunderbirds unable to capitalize on two transition opportunities, but Kew’s clutch gene came in handy, as his fourth game-winning goal of the season ended the Sunday matinee. Georgia got back above .500 with the 13-12 OT win.

Jackson’s 9 PTS (3G, 6A) led the home team in scoring, followed by Cole’s 4 PTS (1G, 3A) and trio of Swarm forwards with three points. Dobson made 47 saves in 63:16 min., finishing the night with an 11.38 GAA and .797 Sv%.

Hill earned the loss despite making 43 saves in his bounceback game. He finished Sunday with a 12.33 GAA and .768 Sv%. Petterson’s 6 PTS (1G, 5A) led the Thunderbirds in points, with Theede’s 5 PTS (4G, 1A) right behind him.

“This is another one-goal loss that we’re going to look back on and say we shoulda, coulda, woulda,” Accursi said. “At the end of the day, the guy’s battled. In this league, you’ve got to show up to play every game in order to win, and we didn’t show up for a good chunk of the game. When it mattered most, we battled, but we have to be more consistent if we want to win.”

The Birds and the Bees

The Thunderbirds’ three right-handed forwards scored a goal apiece, as the Swarm defense did an excellent job to limit their two-man game and box them outside all evening long.

“Kudos to the Swarm,” Accursi said, “they played really good defense. They packed it in, were switching early, came hard with slides, so we couldn’t generate those pick-and-rolls that we normally are able to generate. We found a way to get to where we needed to be, which was overtime, and then try and get that winner mark, but unfortunately, it didn’t happen.”

The Swarm were happy to take advantage of Halifax’s three righties, five lefties lineup, especially considering those bigger and not as fleet of foot lefties would be further from the sub box in the second and fourth quarters, meaning easier short bench transition opportunities for the Swarm. But after their previous two losses, the Swarm were more elated to turn in a solid defensive performance for most of Sunday’s contest.

“Defensively, we had a rough start in Albany and a rough outing in Vancouver, just didn’t play well,” Comeau remarked. “A lot of it’s just about trust and communicating. You watch the goals they scored 5-on-5, we had some communication breakdowns, right? We have to trust the system, we have to trust each other, and that’s always the big thing for us. I thought the guys played great tonight, and Dobber made some great saves when we did have breakdowns. We just need to continue to be aggressive and make sure we’re in a spot where we’re able to pick up — there were a lot of one-and-done possessions tonight, and that’s a huge thing, too, where we’re able to pick up a rebound or Dobber controls the rebound.”

Accursi’s remarks about the team’s worsening transition plays were the first things he said postgame, and the transition focus was unprompted. As the Thunderbirds settled offense floundered early on, it became incredibly noticeable how the Thunderbirds were leaning so hard into their strength — fast breaks — that it circled back around and became a detriment, wasted opportunities that didn’t allow the offense to get in a groove and afforded the Swarm plenty of transition chances of their own.

“When you’re pushing tranny like we were,” Accursi said, “it becomes a track meet, and your O guys are sitting there kind of gnawing at the bit, and then they get out there, they want to shoot because they haven’t shot in two minutes. It snowballs when that happens. That’s when you kind of have to pull the reins back to 5-on-5, settled. (The Swarm) were good. They ran us in the fourth and came hard to the bench.”

“That’s a dangerous team in transition, but we outscored them 5-4 that I had,” Comeau said, “and I thought we outshot them in transition, too. It was really about just saying, ‘Let’s bury our chances there,’ like we’re getting chances, which is a good thing, and we’ve been talking with our D guys, ‘Let’s push the pace, keep pushing and make good decisions.’ Sometimes, the shots don’t drop, but the opportunities are there, and you know they’re eventually going to drop for you.”

Evidence of that philosophy working showed up in the second and fourth quarters. Hill was perfect in the second quarter on Swarm transition chances, keeping the game from spiraling out of hand and allowing his team to get over their slow start and eventually take the lead. But in the fourth quarter, those numerous Swarm transition chances dropped from Jackson.

An added benefit of plenty of running meant forwards would find themselves stuck on defense after following the opponent back in reverse transition.

“One of the key things, twice we were able to push and get their O guys trapped, and we scored on both of those possessions,” Comeau said. “So, those are huge. Sometimes it’s not even about generating the shot; it’s about generating — we call them a “pigeon,” getting an O guy trapped, and we were able to do that.”

One of those pigeon possessions resulted in Benedict’s first goal. The rookie’s feet never stopped moving all game long, as he darted all around the offensive zone setting picks or getting aggressive on rides. His pugnaciousness in reverse transition was reminiscent of Lyle’s indefatigable efforts, where he’s arguably the best in the NLL at hounding a transitioning opponent and preventing scoring chances, if not outright causing a turnover in the neutral zone. But the Swarm coaching staff tasked Benedict to watch a veteran Buffalo Bandits forward and learn from what he does every shift.

“We said he’s got to move his feet and watch Kyle Buchanan,” Comeau said. “There’s a one count for Kyle Buchanan being in the same spot. He’s moving constantly, setting picks. Kaleb set a great pick, got an opportunity like he did in Vancouver, and hopefully we continue to see that from him, he’s going to continue to progress, and to your point, too, he pressed up the floor, caused some turnovers much like Lyle did, Lyle continues to do.”

Sunday was arguably Benedict’s best showing in his rookie campaign so far. The aggression of LT4 and waterbug bustle of Buchanan melded with Benedict’s natural style of play, gritty off-ball work for teammates and a slick penchant for cuts and scoring. Sunday’s showing was a raw amalgam of those qualities, as the 22-year-old continues to refine his style and cement his name in the lineup, but the potential being realized in real time has made Benedict a joy to watch every time he steps on the turf.

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