Completed Event: Men's Lacrosse versus Georgetown on May 10, 2025 , Loss , 12, to, 16
/
Final
Men's Lacrosse
12
vs Georgetown
16
Quotes: Duke 17, Dartmouth 11
2/24/2007 12:00:00 AM | Men's Lacrosse
Duke Coach John Danowski
Opening Statement:
“It is a relief for this to be over; I can feel it in my body. Certainly the amount of emotion that's been carried forward for everyone has been tremendous. The amount of positive energy that was falling in this locker room was really indescribable. It was great. Nevertheless, emotion is emotion and it takes its toll. What happened in the first quarter was about what I expected. I thought that we may get a little overzealous and that we may foul a little bit, but I also thought that Dartmouth is a really good team. They're well-coached and they were really well-prepared. They played very well. I was really pleased with the number of assists we had and I was pleased with the play of some of our seniors. Some of them were unsung heroes and they really stepped up.”
On the meaning of the large crowd:
“I'm not sure exactly what it means, but what I do know is that this is a place that has a tremendous amount of pride and it stands for excellence. You go to basketball games, you walk past Krzyzewskiville, you go women's basketball games and to soccer games; everyone here is about excellence and everybody wants to move forward. They want to move forward for Duke. People just want it to be good again and whole.”
On his first time on the sidelines at Duke:
“It was great. The atmosphere was so electric; it was a big-game atmosphere. To me, from my experience, it was like an NCAA event. There was a tremendous amount of enthusiasm; people in the parking lot, people wearing Duke lacrosse jerseys. In terms of promoting the game and the growth of the game, I just thought it was a tremendous atmosphere. It was fun.”
On the expectations of him and team:
“I don't know how many people at this point yet care about lacrosse and the game and the team. The weight of expectations always come from within; they always come from the athletes themselves. These particular young men have goals. We had a meeting last night like we always do the night before a home game and we talked about goal-setting. But, they were ready to play and they didn't want to be in another classroom situation.”
On what needs work on defense:
“I don't think we played with a tremendous amount of discipline like I saw last week against Brown. I thought that we understood what we were trying to accomplish and today we got really careless and anxious trying to make plays. I thought that we were just a little bit out of control. But, I do think that the film will show that a lot of those mistakes are correctable.”
Senior midfielder Ed Douglas
On the emotions involved with the game:
“I think this will be the most emotional game we probably play all year, at least in terms of returning to the field. And tomorrow will be a nice challenge for us to get right back up and do it again. Certainly there's the hope that with more games there will be a return to normalcy, but as long as those two guys aren't in the locker room with us, we'll know that there's something still not right with the season.”
Senior attacker Matt Danowski
On the feeling of returning to the field:
“It was amazing. It was probably one of the coolest experiences of my life before the game, running out of that tunnel and seeing all the fans' support and the support from the students. It was great.”
On the support from the fans:
“It was more than I expected. It was pretty hyped up, saying ?There's going to be so many people here. The students are going to come out and support us,” but we didn't know what was going to happen. I couldn't be happier with the students. I couldn't be more thankful for all the support we got from everybody.”
Senior defender Tony McDevitt
On the team's nerves in the first half:
“We went into halftime and Coach [Danowski] said, ?Alright, I think now we can settle down.' Half the game, I still felt like a lot of kids were geared up and still feeling that anticipation and nervousness.”
On taking the field again:
“The national anthem was pretty special. There's no doubt about that. Just looking up and seeing the whole crowd, the moment of silence, that was just unbelievable. You felt chills all over you. Your hairs were standing up. It was a great feeling.”
On the team's pregame tribute to Finnerty, Reade, and Seligmann:
“It was pretty special when we were warming up, we see all the middies with 45 on their back, all the attack with 13 and all the ?D' with 6. That was spectacular. That was awesome.”
Junior attacker Zack Greer
On the meaning of playing again:
“Our goal was to come out here and just be back on the field and play our game. There's not much more to it than that. We were looking forward to getting out there and being able to play a game with another color jersey rather than practicing all the time. It was just great to be back out there.”
On falling behind 3-1 in the first quarter:
“You'd expect, maybe, that scenario with everything that was going on here, the big crowd and stuff. But we calmed down and we did what we had to the rest of the game. The first quarter, we ended up 3-3 and that's fine and we took it the rest of the game.”
On the anticipation for the game:
“The big thing was standing there for the national anthem, looking up at the crowd and the flag, and you kind of realize that we're back and we're meant to be here. And then once the starting 10 gets out on the field, it's just starting business as usual.”
Dartmouth Coach Bill Wilson
On the excitement of today's game:
“I think that it's the season opener and both teams were extremely excited to be out there. Obviously there was a lot of media attention coming into the event. Duke did a great job today; they ran up and down the field played an awful lot of personnel between the lines and created a lot of transition for their team.”
On playing Duke given the circumstances:
“I think no matter when it is, Duke or any opponent for that matter, will be geared up, especially a team like Duke, who is high energy. They're a team who wants to get up and down the field for all four quarters. You could see that we ran out of gas a little bit in the third quarter and there were times in between the lines where they sustained that energy level a little bit more than we were able to.”
Sophomore Defender Tim McVeigh
On keeping in touch with the Duke players:
“I see them all the time when we're back home and they always seem to be pretty upbeat and real positive with everything that's going on. You just hope for the best for everything.”
On Duke:
“Coming into the game we felt we had nothing to lose because we knew everybody expected them to really take it to us. We came out with nothing to lose and we felt that if we just played our game we could keep it close.”
Senior Attacker Nick Bonacci
On coming into an atmosphere like today:
“It's definitely exciting to come and play in front of a crowd like this. It's always exciting, but I think you approach every game the same way. You come and play your best and if it's good enough, it's good enough.”
Freshman Defender Andy Gagel
On Dartmouth's early lead:
“It was good to be up 3-1 but I don't think anyone on the team said we're going to run away with this. We knew the way Duke was going to play that there would be a lot of scoring and that two goals wasn't going to win it.”
Players Mentioned
A
/ Men's Lacrosse
A
/ Men's LacrosseM
/ Men's LacrosseD
/ Men's LacrosseDuke Men's Lacrosse: Excellence on and off the field defined
Friday, August 29
Duke Men's Lacrosse Recruiting Video
Friday, August 29
Andrew McAdorey Media Availability 5-7
Wednesday, May 07
John Danowski Media Availability 5-7
Wednesday, May 07
