NLL Insider

The 2008 National Lacrosse League season didn’t go exactly according to plan for the Colorado Mammoth, but then again, whose season does?

Wins and losses aside, every single franchise in any pro sport is gonna come face to face with the unexpected. It’s the team that guts it through that adversity that usually stands tallest at the end of the season and the Mammoth, for sure, faced their share of tests. That’s by no means a slam on the wooly beasts, but when your transition game inexplicably disappears and one of your top offensive guns is shelved with just 11 games under his belt, that’s a tall order to overcome.

“We were affected by injuries just as everybody else probably is,” says Colorado general manager Steve Govett. “But losing Dan Carey, that’s something that a challenge to replace.”

The 5-0 start to 2008 certainly was encouraging, and even losing to Philadelphia in the sixth game of the season was easy enough to stomach. Running the table in the NLL isn’t an easy thing to do. What Colorado wasn’t planning on was the tailspin that followed with three losses in the next four games. Even after that, the Mammoth weren’t able to recapture that early-season momentum and they couldn’t string together back-to-back victories until late in the season.

“The level of inconsistency on our offense was frustrating,” Govett says.  “We were attempting to recover from the loss of Dan Carey (upper body) and we really struggled with the transition. It was something we were kinda known for and we kinda got away from that.”

Govett says Carey’s healed and ready to roll with fellow offensive guns Gavin Prout, Brian Langtry and Jamie Shewchuk. Throw the signing of Gary Rosyski and top draft pick Matt Danowski into the mix, and his eagerness to learn the box game, and Govett is expecting the offense to be in high gear.

“He’s a guy that’s well-heeled in playing under pressure and in front of a large crowd,” Govett says.  “He’s a coach’s kid, with a lacrosse IQ and with the massive adversity and massive scrutiny he played under while at Duke, he understands what it means to play in a fishbowl, and that’s what Colorado is.”

A big bright spot for the Mammoth in 2008 was the defense. The squad was tops in the NLL with fewest shots allowed and goals-against, so Govett is confident that sorta game will be back in 2009 despite the retirement of co-captain Pat Coyle.

“We’ve got a solid defense,” Govett says.  “We lost only one player on that end … so we just need to work on transition from defense to offense and getting the ball up the floor faster.”

In the run-and-gun world of the NLL, transition can make or break a team and the Mammoth are hoping that once they iron out the wrinkles in their transition game, they’ll be able to avoid the disappointment of 2008 and a first-round exit from the playoffs.

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