Watching Syracuse and Rochester play box lacrosse is comparable to watching Syracuse University and Princeton play college basketball.

The athletic Smash players can dazzle fans with flashes of individual brilliance, bringing fans to their feet with long lead passes and behind-the-back shots. The veteran Knighthawks counter with pick-and-roll, pick-and-roll, pick-and-roll, exploiting any defensive lapse with pinpoint passes that set up high-percentage shots.

Friday night, the plodders prevailed, using a 7-0 run capped by Regy Thorpe's breakaway goal with four seconds left in the first half to propel them to a 17-15 victory before an announced crowd of 5,347 at the Onondaga County War Memorial. The loss pushed the Smash (2-3), which was playing its first game in three weeks, into the bottom half of the seven-team National Lacrosse League heading into Sunday's afternoon game on Long Island against New York. Counting exhibition games, it was the fourth consecutive victory for Rochester (4-3) over Syracuse this season.

It was also a breakout game for four-time Syracuse University All-American and Rochester rookie Casey Powell, who scored three goals and had three assists. In the team's first six games, of which Powell played three, the top selection in September's draft had two goals and six assists.

"We played hard, and I think they wore out a little bit," Powell said afterward. "We moved the ball well, and they kind of got lost a little bit on defense."

The Smash appeared to be anything but lost midway through the second quarter when Mike Benedict raced down the left side of the floor and fired a behind-the-back shot from a wide angle that froze Knighthawks goalie Pat O'Toole and gave Syracuse an 8-6 lead. The goal sent O'Toole to the bench in favor of Derek General, who had frustrated Syracuse repeatedly in a Rochester victory on 23 January.

General worked his magic again, shutting out the Smash for the next 12 minutes, while his team methodically turned the two-goal deficit into a five-goal lead. The killer was the breakaway goal by Thorpe, another former SU star who is regarded as the league's best defensive player but is not known for his scoring prowess.

"Yeah, I guess you'd have to say he's got our number," Syracuse's Paul Gait said. "But the game was really decided between the lines, not in the goals. Loose ball play and hustle ... they won it big in those departments. General played a good game, but a goalie is going to play well when he's only seeing one shot. Their guys got two or three shots, and they cashed in on a lot of rebounds."

The Smash got big offensive performances from Gait (four goals, four assists), Ed Fay (2-6) and Benedict (4-1), but it wasn't enough to overcome the numerous defensive breakdowns that led to in-close goals.

A case in point occurred in the third quarter when Gait finally ended the Smash's scoring drought and Neal Powless scored 42 seconds later to narrow the margin to 13-10 and get the crowd back into the game. When Thorpe went off for roughing seconds later, the Smash had a golden opportunity to make it a two-goal game. Instead, a fumbled groundball by Syracuse led to a short-handed goal by Duane Jacobs, and Rochester led by four again and wasn't threatened the rest of the way.

"Mental lapses. Mental lapses," Smash goalie Jim Rankin said as he walked off the carpet. "You can't win the game with those kinds of lapses."

Now, in order for the Smash to achieve bench coach Freeman Bucktooth's goal of being .500 halfway through the season, it must win the first road game in franchise history on Sunday afternoon. It would appear to have a likely candidate in the Saints, who are 1-4 after losing 13-9 at Toronto.

"It's possible," Gait said. "We have the ability. But we have to play a lot better, with a lot more intensity than we did tonight. Intensity was the factor tonight."

BOX SUMMARY
                                  1  2  3  4     TOT
Rochester Knighthawks (4-3)       4  7  5  1  --  17
Syracuse Smash (2-3)              4  4  3  4  --  15

ROCHESTER KNIGHTHAWKS         SYRACUSE SMASH
               G - A   PTS                   G - A   PTS
Jacobs         4 - 3     7    Gait           4 - 4     8
Powell         3 - 3     6    Fay            2 - 5     7
Driscoll       1 - 4     5    M Benedict     4 - 1     5
McCready       0 - 4     4    Accursi        1 - 2     3
Teat           2 - 1     3    Powless        1 - 2     3
Malawsky       1 - 2     3    Morrissey      0 - 3     3
Hollenbeck     0 - 3     3    Alexander      1 - 1     2
Mearns         0 - 3     3    Prat           1 - 1     2
Soudan         2 - 0     2    Halladay       0 - 2     2
Bomberry       1 - 1     2    Millon         1 - 0     1
Hasen          1 - 1     2    O Benedict     0 - 1     1
Kruger         1 - 1     2    Collins        0 - 1     1
Thorpe         1 - 1     2    Jones          0 - 1     1
Dance          0 - 1     1    Oudemool       0 - 1     1
MacArthur      0 - 1     1

Shots on goal           56    Shots on goal           51
Saves made by           36    Saves made by           39
   General           22          Collins           26
   O'Toole           14          Rankin            13
Loose Balls             71    Loose Balls             83

*** STATS OFFICIAL BY VERIFY WITH KNIGHTHAWKS WEB SITE ***