Before he could even settle into his place between the pipes, Bobby Wardwell was down three goals. Princeton was taking shots aggressively, sending bullets past him that he could barely even react to. In his first minutes of collegiate action, the freshman was understandably unnerved.

But after those three unanswered Tigers goals, Wardwell found a comfort zone and made it a challenge for Princeton to score.

‘I was pretty rattled after they hit the first couple pipes,’ Wardwell said, ‘but the rest of the team kind of calmed me down, and we all got back into it.’

The revolving door of Syracuse’s goaltenders spun once again, and this time, it was Wardwell’s turn to take his place in the cage. Wardwell was charged with stopping Princeton’s formidable scoring attack as Syracuse tried to snap a two-game losing streak. Though he got off to a shaky start, Wardwell made all the necessary saves to preserve Syracuse’s lead in the Orange’s (5-4, 2-1 Big East) 10-9 win over the Tigers (6-3) on Saturday. He finished with nine saves and became a dominant force at times as the game wore on.

Wardwell found out he would be starting on Thursday, joining Dominic Lamolinara and Matt Lerman as goalies to earn the opportunity this season. SU head coach John Desko has included Wardwell in the competition in goal all season, but he had yet to give him a chance to prove himself.

So on Saturday, Wardwell finally got the call.

‘We like to evaluate the guys during the week, but we felt we had a pretty good read on Dom and Matt, and we thought we knew what we were going to get out of them if they were in the game,’ Desko said. ‘We thought that if we were going to try Bob, this was the time to do it this far along in the season.’

The Tigers went ahead 3-0 early, catching Wardwell off guard with all three scores. The freshman was either late moving to the side of the goal where Princeton shot or didn’t throw his stick up in time to make the save.

On the third goal, Tigers midfielder Tom Schreiber dodged SU defender Matt Harris and ripped a low shot into the goal with 7:33 left in the first quarter. Wardwell never had a chance to try and make the save, and the freshman then walked around in the crease for a few moments with his head down.

Syracuse’s defense reconvened and gave Wardwell an impromptu pep talk. As a team, SU’s offense and defense settled in, but it was Wardwell’s performance that was the most significant.

‘Bobby’s got a hard head on his shoulders,’ defender Brian Megill said. ‘He lets things go right away. It’s a real testament to him and being a freshman and all.’

Still, Wardwell had the occasional hiccup.

At 2:31 in the first quarter, Princeton midfielder Jeff Froccaro tried to dunk the ball high into the net, but Wardwell got his stick up in time to deflect it. But he tipped it right behind him, and then couldn’t find it. The ball slowly rolled into the net to give the Tigers a 4-2 lead.

Just more than one minute into the second quarter, though, Wardwell made a critical man-down save on a hard, 20-yard shot from Tigers midfielder Tucker Shanley.

‘We talked about adjusting as the game wore on because he made a lot of saves high,’ Princeton head coach Chris Bates said. ‘We had a lot of opportunities. He stood tall in his first college game. I give the kid a lot of credit.’

Wardwell’s biggest saves came in the second half. He made two huge fourth-quarter saves to preserve a 9-9 tie, and after the Orange took a 10-9 lead, Wardwell made what was his marquee save of the game.

With SU down a player after a penalty on defender David Hamlin, Schreiber shot high, but Wardwell quickly threw his stick up and caught the shot to keep Syracuse’s one-goal lead.

As the game went on, Wardwell improved and became an increasing force between the pipes, culminating in that save. For a freshman in his collegiate start, Wardwell certainly didn’t hurt his chances of seeing more time in the net.

‘They hit a couple pipes early, and some guys would maybe not get better as the game went on, and he got better as the game went on,’ Desko said. ‘… I think it showed his mental toughness today.’

cjiseman@syr.edu

Published on April 7, 2012 at 12:00 pm

Contact Chris: cjiseman@syr.edu | @chris_iseman