No. 3 Duke Hosts No. 2 Notre Dame in Thursday Night Lacrosse

The Opening Faceoff

Duke is 11-1, tied for the best record through 12 games in program history. The 2005 squad went 11-0 before suffering its first loss and the 2008 squad was 11-1. The Blue Devils stayed put at No. 3 in the USILA poll following the win at Virginia last week.
Freshman Brennan O'Neill recorded a hat trick and five points overall, while Joe Robertson had two goals and three assists, including the overtime winner in Charlottesville. Mike Adler made 16 saves in the setback as Duke held Virginia without a goal for the final 18:04 of the game.
Thursday's matchup will be the fifth straight week the Blue Devils will be embroiled in a top-five battle with another ACC program. It will be the third time these two teams will meet with both ranked in the top-five.
Notre Dame has not played a game since it faced the Blue Devils April 10. Thursday's contest will be just the Irish's eighth game of the year, compared to Duke's 13. It will be a matchup of elite offensive and defensive units with both teams ranking in the top 12 in both scoring offense and defense. It also features the league's top two goaltenders and two of the nation's top 10 faceoff specialists in Jake Naso and Kyle Gallagher.

Duke – Notre Dame by the Numbers
59 – Consecutive games Michael Sowers has scored a point - every game of his career
4.25 – Joe Robertson's points per game average against ACC teams this season
50 – Point Nakeie Montgomery needs to join Duke's 100-point club
15.50 – Duke's scoring average, fifth in the country
3.86 – Assists per game for Notre Dame attackman Pat Kavanagh
1 - Assist for Kavanagh in the first outing against Duke
7.43 - Notre Dame's goals against aaverage, the best in the league
.682 – The Irish's man-up offense percentage, the highest in the country
8-2 – Duke's record under Danowski in rematches against an opponent after a loss in the regular season

Duke Meets notre dame in another Top-5 Showdown

For the fifth straight week, the Blue Devils will face a top-five team. Duke and Notre Dame stayed put at No. 3 and No. 2, respectively.
Thursday night's contest will be the third time these two programs will meet when ranked in the top five and the first with both in the top three. Duke is ranked lower for the first time since the regular season game in 2017 when the No. 10 Blue Devils beat No. 3 Notre Dame, 11-8.
Duke is 3-2 when ranked lower in top 10 matchups with Notre Dame. The Blue Devils have been the higher ranked team in the previous two top-five battles.

Individual Matchups Round 2

Thursday's game will feature round two of a few intriguing individual matchups. Top scorers Pat Kavanagh of Notre Dame and Blue Devils Michael Sowers and Joe Robertson lead their respective offenses, while Duke's JT Giles-Harris and Irish defenseman Jack Kielty anchor the stalwart defenses. Mike Adler has been stellar in goal along with Notre Dame's Liam Entenmann, while the faceoff specialists in Duke's Jake Naso and the Irish's Kyle Gallagher are third and second in the ACC, respectively.
In the first outing, Giles-Harris and the Duke defense held Kavanagh to just two points, while Kielty and Notre Dame kept Sowers to just one assist and held the Blue Devils to only eight goals.
At the faceoff X, Naso was dominant in winning 16-of-22 draws on the day, but in goal Entenmann had the edge with 12 saves on 20 shots on goal (.600) compared to Adler's 11 stops.

A Win over Notre Dame Would

Be head coach John Danowski's 430th career win
Be Danowski's 211th win at Duke
Be Danowski's 35th ACC victory
Be the program's 600th overall victory; the 14th DI team to reach the milestone
Make Duke 192-180 in the month of April
Be Duke's fourth top-5 win of the season

Duke against top-10 foes

When Duke and Notre Dame meet Thursday, it will be the 114th time the Blue Devils have played a top-10 opponent since 2007. Duke is 71-42 in the games and Duke is 28-34 when ranked lower.
Duke and Notre Dame are playing for the third time with both programs ranked in the top five and for the 17th time as top-10 foes.

Danowski in Rematches

For the first time in his Duke tenure, John Danowski will face an ACC team twice in the regular season when it hosts Notre Dame for the second game in 12 days. Duke has met the Irish the most of any of its regular season foes, going 7-3 in postseason rematches.
Head coach John Danowski is 25-15 overall in postseason rematches from regular season games at Duke. He is 8-2 in rematches when the Blue Devils lose the regular season contest.

Scouting Notre Dame

Notre Dame returns to the lacrosse field for the first time since beating the Blue Devils, April 10. The Irish are 6-1 overall and ranked No. 2. The lone setback was to Virginia.
In a change from years past, Notre Dame features a high-scoring offense averaging 14.57 goals per game. In 2019, the Irish averaged just over 11 per contest. Pat Kavanagh quarterbacks the offense with 3.86 assists per game and 5.57 points per game. He has scored five-plus points in five of his seven outings, but only managed a goal and an assist last time versus the Blue Devils.
Defensively, Notre is allowing just 7.43 goals per game and have limited five of its seven opponents to single digit goals. Jack Kielty has five caused turnovers and nine ground balls as the anchor to the defense. Jose Boyer has a team-best nine takeaways.
At the X, Kyle Gallagher is second in the ACC with a .663 win percentage and 6.43 ground balls per game. He has won at least 68 percent of faceoffs in five of his seven games.
In goal, Liam Entenmann has a 7.44 goals against average and is saving 59 percent of shots he faces. He is tied for first nationally in save percentage and averages 10.57 save per game.

The Clearing Game

In the first game against the Irish, Duke struggled to clear the ball, going 21-of-29 in the category. The Blue Devils currently rank 36th nationally with a .846 percentage. Notre Dame is first at .917. The Irish's opponent clearing percentage is .818, second best in the league and 15th in the country.
Against Virginia, owner of the nation's best ride, Duke was a solid 24-of-27, failing to clear twice to start the game and only one more time after that.
Duke has played the top three teams in opponent clearing percentage in Virginia, Denver and High Point and went 24-of-27, 20-of-21 and 16-of-22 in those games, respectively, for an .857 success rate.

O'Neill Getting Comfortable

O'Neill bounced between midfield and attack in the first few games of the year before finding a permanent home on attack with Sowers and Joe Robertson.
In his debut against Denver, O'Neill played attack and had three goals and four points overall. He had two points in each of the next two games and has now hit his stride with 23 points in the past six games- a 3.83 per game average.

Nakeie Montgomery at His Best

Senior Nakeie Montgomery is having his best season yet this year. He ranks fourth on the team in points with 11 goals and 19 assists. Montgomery, Joe Robertson and Michael Sowers are the only Blue Devils to have both double-digit goals and assists.
The Dallas, Texas, native can impact a game in a variety of ways. He possesses incredible vision as well as the ability to beat a defender one-on-one to score. He is second on the team with 19 assists and is sixth in goals and needs one point to reach the 100-point benchmark.
The 30 points are 16 more than he had in the eight games in 2020. He had a career-best 39 points his sophomore season for a 2.73 points per game average.

Up Next

The Blue Devils close out the regular season in May, traveling to Chapel Hill for a second meeting with the Tar Heels. Faceoff is May 2 at 4 p.m., on ACC Network.

#GoDuke

No. 3 Duke Hosts No. 2 Notre Dame in Thursday Night Lacrosse

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Players Mentioned

Mike Adler

JT Giles-Harris

Nakeie Montgomery

Jake Naso

Brennan O'Neill

Joe Robertson

Michael Sowers

Duke information

No. 3 Duke Hosts No. 2 Notre Dame in Thursday Night Lacrosse

Next Event

Players Mentioned

Mike Adler

JT Giles-Harris

Nakeie Montgomery

Jake Naso

Brennan O'Neill

Joe Robertson

Michael Sowers

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Duke information