March 17, 2001 • Rohnert Park, CA - California lacrosse just doesn't get any better than this.

Before a sun-drenched crowd pushing 400 spectators and a game time temperature of 68 degrees, the Sonoma State defense held Cal to one goal in the second half to hang on to a clean, well played 8-7 win.

Kevin Moon of Cal gave a preview of the intensity associated with this rivalry early in the first quarter when he dodged through 4 guys to score the first goal. Maybe that wasn't the soundest lacrosse strategy, but Moon would not be stopped. Michael Fritz, a junior midfielder for Sonoma, matched Cal's determination by charging the goal and equalizing with a bouncer, one all. David Dean would score on a high shot from close in to give Cal the lead at the quarter, 2-1.

The second quarter featured two 4-goal spurts. Sonoma State came out fast with Fritz scooping up a ground ball from the opening face-off and tying the game on a shot that trickled under Cal goalie Robbie Warner. Don Collins added another tally off a feed from John Minan. Sonoma would score two more times to complete the first four-goal run of the quarter. The Cossacks lead 5-2.

Cal mirrored the Sonoma State spurt with one of their own. It would figure the Moon brothers had something to do with it. Chris scored off a pass from his identical twin brother Kevin, to narrow the lead to 5-3. Cal added a man-up goal, along with 2 perfectly placed shots into the top right corner by John Principi and Kevin Moon, to lead at intermission, 6-5.

Both teams came into this game with big out-of-conference wins. Last Saturday, Cal beat USLIA #1 BYU in Utah, and at home, Sonoma State knocked off #7 Virginia Tech. So far, those tough wins didn't seem to take anything out of the players. Would the second half be different?

Matt Dennig, Sonoma's excellent face-off midfielder who won 10 of 16 draws on the day, controlled the first face of the 2nd half, leading to Blake Abbate's sweeping right-handed rip-shot--to tie the game for the fourth time--just 25 seconds into the quarter. That would be the last tie. Sonoma State would grind out 2 more goals to take an 8-6 lead into the fourth quarter. The Cossack defense with their freshman goalie, Dominic Gomez, shut out the Golden Bears for the entire 3rd period.

Sonoma came out in a ball-controlled, spread offense to start the fourth. Slowing the game down--part of the reason was offensive strategy and the other part was due to Cal's tremendous defense--Coach Doug Carl of Sonoma State commented, "We were looking to get a good pass off a backdoor cut, not a drive (to the goal).

Cal cut everybody off and took away our backdoor cuts. We weren't thinking of a drive for a score. We controlled the ball because we didn't want to deal with their potent offense." This strategy worked for most of the fourth quarter. Cal did have their chances though. Sonoma State miscues gave Cal the ball; four straight critical possessions, Cal gave it back. A frustrated Coach Joe Proud said, "Our defense played very well, but we need to control the ball on offense. They (Sonoma State) were good at keeping possession, maintaining composure, and rotating players in and out for fresh legs. We couldn't get our "D" out. They (Sonoma State) did that better than we did today. We were out-coached."

With 2 minutes remaining in the fourth quarter and clinging to an 8-6 lead, SSU had possession of the ball up top. Kevin Terry, Cal's leopard-fast midfielder, stripped a Cossack of the ball and started a textbook fast break that ended with a Greg Guy goal off a David Dean feed. That goal would finish the scoring. Cal had one more chance, but Gomez would make the save on a high shot and keep Sonoma State undefeated, and on top of the Western Collegiate Lacrosse League North "A" division.

Coach Proud added, "The good thing about this loss is we will learn from it. We still have time to adjust. Against Sonoma State, you have to be mentally tough. We need to be mentally tough to stay with the game plan and play with composure. We might have been overconfident coming off the BYU win. This is a good wakeup call."