The Idaho club lacrosse team handed Gonzaga its first loss of the season Sunday in Spokane. The Vandals improved to 5-3 on the season with the 14-9 victory over the Bulldogs.
Parker Wilson | Argonaut
The Idaho club lacrosse team sets up for a passing drill Wednesday during practice on the SprinTurf. The Vandals beat Gonzaga 14-9 Sunday in Spokane to improve to 5-3 on the season. The team plays Oregon on Saturday in the Kibbie Dome for a Support Our Troops charity game. It will be the first time Idaho has played in the Dome in five years.
“I thought for us, this was probably our most complete game,” first-year Idaho coach Sammy Seidenberg said. “Today, we put it all together from the defense to the offense. We played really well on the defensive end. Then we were going on the offensive end, scoring the ball, getting good shots.”
Seidenberg said the win was the largest-scoring margin over Gonzaga in the team’s recent history. He said the Bulldogs usually play really tight, but Idaho was able to control the pace — which contributed to the win.
“This was very much a team victory. If you look at the stats, it was so spread out,” Seidenberg said. “We had six goal scorers and everybody really contributed … A couple big moments in the game, we went a man down for a couple minutes and we were able to kill the penalty and then come out and score three quick goals, which is really huge — a big momentum shift as well.”
Idaho’s offensive and defensive players of the game were Harrison Sawyer and Craig Patrick respectively. The Vandals have struggled with the faceoff this season, but Sawyer topped Gonzaga’s faceoff player on Sunday, Seidenberg said. On the defensive side, Patrick snagged 16 saves.
Other Vandal standouts include Patrick Tunison with four goals, Colton Raichl with three goals and Deric Wilson with two goals and three assists.
“Our whole goal every game is to score more than 10 … and we were able to do that today,” Seidenberg said. “Lacrosse is a high scoring sport, so you usually get that kind of scoring. In my opinion, we probably could have had five or six more (goals). We hit a couple posts but we were getting looks a lot. We had a lot of really good chances.”
Next up, Idaho plays Oregon on Saturday in the Kibbie Dome. It’s is the first time Idaho has had a game in the Dome in five years. The game is also a charity game for Support Our Troops.
“I know all the guys, and the community as well, are really excited about it,” Seidenberg said. “Oregon’s a tough team, we’ve never beat them and this year I think we really do have a chance to beat them with the guys playing the way they are and us being 5-3 right now. I definitely feel like we have a good chance of taking it to Oregon, especially in the Dome.”
Stephan Wiebe can be reached at [email protected]