- Joined
- May 8, 2002
- Posts
- 1,244,961
- Reaction score
- 59
You must be registered for see images attach
Pat Kavanagh received the ball, looking to run down as much time and see out a narrow one-goal lead. With the clock running out, defenders harassed and battered the ball-carrier to win back possession.
In the dying embers of a war of attrition, it was Denver’s talisman who found the will to win in the final moment.
The Outlaws defeated the Carolina Chaos 10-8 on Saturday afternoon in Fairfield. Nursing a one-goal lead, Kavanagh spun his way through three defenders and a sea of flailing stick checks to beat the Carolina defense for the game-sealing goal.
“Just power cradle and pray. I don’t know, honestly,” Kavanagh told ESPN’s Dana Boyle, explaining how he fought through the swarm.
PAT KAVANAGH WOULD NOT BE STOPPED
He ices the game for the Outlaws with an incredible effortpic.twitter.com/hdTAI1sjC6
— ESPN (@espn) July 18, 2026
Saturday was a test of willpower, and Kavanagh’s guile highlighted a Denver team that willed itself to a victory.
For the second consecutive week, things did not come easily.
The Chaos blitzed the Outlaws defense with five first-quarter goals. In back-to-back weeks, Denver has allowed five goals and trailed by two scores after the first quarter. Whether it was the rain, the opponent or the moment, it took time for the Outlaws to get off the bus.
But even with a slow start, Denver righted the ship thanks in large part to an elite defensive performance.
Eric Spanos scored for Carolina with 0:43 to play in the opening quarter. For the next 31 minutes and 18 seconds of game action — nearly two-thirds of the entire game — the Chaos could not put the ball in the back of the net.
Goalie Logan McNaney returned to form following the worst performance of his career. He made 14 saves at 63.6% while the Outlaws defense challenged the Carolina shooters throughout the day.
“We took care of, call it the heart, the paint,” McNaney said. “Obviously you don’t want to let goals up in there, so we just settled in and trusted our matchups.”
A flurry of goals from Logan Wisnauskas, who scored a hat trick in the first half, allowed Denver to pull in front. But the Outlaws didn’t put things away.
The Carolina defense kept Denver off the board most of the second half. The Outlaws used interesting wrinkles in the substitution game, with Wisnauskas and Jared Bernhardt (2G) rotating between attack and midfield, but they never found the next gear to kill off the game.
That gave Chaos a chance to break the dam in front of McNaney’s goal. A mishandled ball from the netminder trickled over the line and broke the seal. Less than three minutes later, the game was tied at eight.
Against the Cannons a week ago, it was a flurry of fourth-quarter goals that erased all of the good work in the middle of the game and led to a loss. With 3:10 to go in this game, it seemed Denver was spinning out into the same crash.
But good teams find ways to win, even without their best performance.
“I think our compete level was really high all day,” Soudan said. “There wasn’t too much to talk about besides, ‘All right, it’s our turn now.’”
Brennan O’Neill, pointless to that point, found captain Justin Anderson for the go-ahead goal with 81 seconds to go. A vital faceoff win from Luke Wierman, who finished 13-for-21 (61.9%) on the day, got the ball back and led to Kavanagh’s herculean fight for the game-clinching goal.
The result went Denver’s way, but the team is staring at issues heading into the most important weekend of the regular season six days from now on home soil. The slow starts and an inconsistent offense will continue to be question marks heading to the home stretch.
But there is no question the Outlaws are a team with the intangibles to scrap in any and every game they play the rest of this season.
Continue reading...
