Towson at Loyola: Three things to watch

The Tigers played admirably in a 15-10 loss to Virginia this past Sunday, but shot themselves in the foot on face-offs. The Cavaliers won the first seven face-offs en route to winning 10-of-17 on the day. Prior to the showing against Virginia, Towson had won 50 percent of its face-offs. The unit must produce numbers close to that to have a shot at upsetting the Greyhounds, according to Tigers coach Tony Seaman. "We have to do a better job of facing off," he said. "You can’t give teams like that the ball back. They’re just too talented. And we’re facing another team that has talent in a different way. They’re just so well-coached." Loyola, by the way, is ranked 10 in the country with a .574 face-off percentage.

Fresh off of an 18-3 pasting of Air Force, the Greyhounds might be feeling good about themselves. They rank fifth in the nation in defense (7.0 goals per game) and ninth in man-down defense (75 percent) and now meet a Towson team that is struggling thus far. But coach Charley Toomey pointed out that all four of the Tigers’ losses have come from Top 20 opponents (Virginia, Maryland, No. 15 Stony Brook and No. 17 Bucknell). That’s why Toomey is emphasizing the risk in overlooking Towson. "What I’m preaching is, you’ve got a wounded animal coming into Loyola this weekend, and they are going to fight and claw and compete," he said. "I think you’ll see a Loyola team ready to do the same."

The Tigers haven’t exactly torched the scoreboard, but senior midfielders Christian Pastirik (11 goals and 7 assists) and Will Harrington (11, 1) have been playing well recently. They – along with junior attackman Tim Stratton (6, 7) – will need to continue scoring against what is becoming a stingy Loyola defense. Senior defenseman Steve Layne and junior defenseman Steve Dircks make it difficult for opposing offenses to attack junior goalkeeper Jake Hagelin, who ranks fourth in the country with a 7.02 goals-against average.