Sunday, February 27, 2011

Bumblebee Tuna

Today I had two family members within the course of about 3 hours complain to me that I hadn't updated the blog. Eat your heart out loved ones.

Start things off with an awesome commercial I saw today.


Four weeks have gone by and we have definitely made a lot of progress. The team has come a long way since that first day we suited up together back in September. This past week we started ironing out the details of our game. Face-offs, man-up, man-down, 6v6 you know the good stuff.

This weekend was a little crazy due high school playoff basketball games being played in our field house. It's not that I have a problem with them using our facilities for high school basketball games. I just don't understand WHY they would want to. The floors in that gym are the farthest thing from hardwood ever. If concrete and linoleum had an illegitimate child it would be the PSU field house. How in gods name you could consider playing a basketball game on that is beyond me.

I digress.

We had a nice little red and white scrimmage between the squad. It was nice to play some full field and get up and down. Gordie played out of his mind in net. Tomorrow is film and possibly some basketball (BALLLLLLLIN).

So we are currently 5 days away from our season opener in good old Danbury, Connecticut. At this point I am chomping at the bit to play a game and get this season going.

It seems from the emails I've been receiving from Mrs.Kramer that we have an awesome weekend set up down on "the island". Fun fact: Only ten players on the team are NOT from Long Island. Yea, nothing like sitting in the locker room and hearing debates about how Nassau/Suffolk is so much better than Suffolk/Nassau or how (insert LI high school team here) is way better than (insert LI high school team here) because they beat them in a fall scrimmage at the Pumpkin Lax Jamboree Shootout. Sick.

The one thing I have realized is that it seems that winning a county or Long Island championship is all that seems to matter to these gentleman. No one seems to care about the playoffs after that. Apparently the rest of NY state does not play lacrosse? (Sidenote: I am 99% sure on LI in high school football their is only a LI champion that doesn't go on to play the rest of the state. Someone please explain this to me.)

Truth is I find it all entertaining and I consider myself somewhat knowledgeable on the area after having spent the past 4 years hanging out with LI historian Kyle Norchi.

The Knicks beat the Heat tonight with Billups coming up huge at the end. Funny story: My friend was on vacation in some Caribbean island and had seen Chauncy Billups around the resort he was staying at. So one day his Dad gets in the elevator and low and behold who is there, Mr. Billups. What does my friends dad do.

(Stares at him for a couple of seconds) Hey! Big Shot Billups....Ha. (Walks out of elevator).

Black Swan didn't win the Oscar for best picture but a very pregnant Natalie Portman did win for best actress. Hey I definitely agree she was great in Black Swan but that wasn't her best work.



The Professional duh.

For those of you wondering where I get all those ridiculous facts at the end of the last few blogs I go here, and this time I think I found a winner:

In 10th-century Burma, King Theinhko ate a farmer’s cucumbers without permission. The farmer killed the king and took the throne.

Life was so simple back then.

Try and watch this video without laughing I dare you.
-DeFran




Sunday, February 20, 2011

Power suit, power tie, power steering

Week number three in the books.

The teams looking good. Still have a ways to go before West Conn in two weeks but we are on the right track. I would tell you more but I wouldn't want to give away any of our secrets.

Plattsburgh has been typical Plattsburgh. Thursday and Friday it was about 55 degrees. I'm pretty sure I caught a tan on the way to practice. This weekend the cold has returned. Going to Plattsburgh is like dating a crazy girl. You never know what you're gonna get. One day it's sunny and beautiful out and everyone is happy and women are tanning on roofs in bathing suits. The next it's bitter cold and you can't tell the difference between a male and female due to how much they are wrapped up. Regardless we battle on. PSU lacrosse is like the U.S. Postal service: We'll play through rain, snow, sleet and hail.

A 20-year-old rookie by the name of Trevor Bayne won the Daytona 500. This will be the first and last post on make regarding NASCAR. The Knicks continue to mess up the 'Melo trade. Just saw this in an article regarding 'Melo's talks with the Nets:

"It was a fantastic meeting, trust me," Prokhorov said, according to CNBC.com. "No words, live music, excellent atmosphere. We looked into each other's eyes. Just real man talk."

"We looked into each other's eyes."

Quick note on the dunk contest last night. Serge Ibaka of Oklahoma City Thunder got absolutely robbed. I am a huge Blake Griffin fan but Ibaka took off from behind the free-throw line. Not even Dr. J did that. Also I'm not a big fan of all these props. The dunk contest should be a dunk contest, not a "Who Can Bring Out the Most Toys" contest. All-in-all best dunk contest I've seen since Vince Carter. As usual Charles Barkley had some great commentary.

But who cares about all that because this weekend lacrosse officially kicked off. The Duke/Notre Dame game was on ESPN today which was great, except for the fact they didn't score a goal until about 20 minutes into the game. Exciting lacrosse. D-III started up as well with many teams from down south getting a couple of games under their belts. Can't wait until we get on the field on March 4th.

Guess what state has the longest coastline of the continental U.S. California? Florida? No and no.

Michigan. Hope that wins you a t-shirt at your local pub on trivia night.

Love it.
-DeFran



Wednesday, February 16, 2011

There will always be sharks...but how often does this once in a lifetime wave come along

First wanted to clear up something I learned in practice today. According to Coach Cavanagh the track inside is 160 METERS. According to Google there are approximately 1609.344 meters in a mile, so the math works. Problem solved.

I also wanted to mention something that slipped through the cracks these past couple of weeks. Senior defenseman Will Folgherait was named the third team captain for the 2011 season at the
beginning of the semester. Will worked his tail off during the off season. He is a big presence for us down low and a real motivator during practice. The kid has a great work ethic and knowledge of the game. Will also has the pleasure of being one of my housemates these past two years. His all time favorite movie is PCU. His number one actor of all time is Steve Buscemi. All in all I think me, Kyle and Will bring three different personalities and leadership styles.

It's gonna be 44 degrees tommorow. 44 DEGREES! It's February in Plattsburgh. I think people might start opening there pools if this keeps up. Oh wait it's gonna be 5 degrees on Tuesday.
Screw it I'm gonna enjoy it while I can.

Buster Poindexter is actually David Johansen who is in the band New York Dolls and is al
so an actor who appeared in an episode of The Adventures of Pete and Pete.

Sweet.
-DeFran




Tuesday, February 15, 2011

There's a jungle cat in the bathroom!

Things are going great up here in North Pole Jr. Practice is really starting to flow. All the drills we did a couple of weeks ago are starting to come together and show up in the bigger picture. With West Conn a little over two weeks away it's time to really start focusing on our goals.

Practice ended with Gennies which is basically 3 on 2's on a shortened field. Definitely one of my favorite drills due to the ridiculous trash talk that comes out once things get going. There is nothing like scoring a goal and then staring down the opposing team as you tell them how terrible they are (PG version). Although my team lost freshman middie Conor "Don't call him Adidas Cuz he wears" Denike along with freshman long stick Courtney "A.C. Slater" Cox had some nice top shelf rips. (Sidenote: I have been shopping around Conor's nickname since Saturday. Although everyone has agreed it's terrible I will continue to use it until it sticks.)

West Conn in a little over two weeks, than down to the lovely island for Farmingdale. Should be a great first weekend.


As for the mystery surround our foreign followers I believe I discovered why we were getting so many Russian readers. Last night on Letterman the SI Swimsuit Edition Cover was released with Irina Shayk getting the big shot.
And wouldn't you know that Irina is from Russia.

Well looks like I know who has been keeping tabs on Plattsburgh lacrosse in the old USSR.



Well today I was informed I have less than 90 days left as a college student. That's just great...

They don't make music videos like they used to
-DeFran



Monday, February 14, 2011

Mystery Solved?

So remember when I asked why so many people from all over the world viewed the blog. It seems Rochdale's finest Joe Tyers has the solution.

For those of you that don't know, Joe came to Plattsburgh last year as an exchange student and played on the team. He was well liked by everyone and to this day I haven't met many people that love lacrosse more than him. To learn more about Joe here's an article I wrote about him last year.

Here is what Joe wrote on my Facebook wall today:

Dear Defran
I cant be arsed writing an email because that is too much effort. But in response to your question on the blog, the reason why people in other countries read your blog, was to follow my progress last year haha. Being the only European to play for the... dirty birds, i speak on behalf of the whole of Europe as i am clearly a thug/O.G. and a BOSS
I hope this answers your query.
yours sincerely,
Tyers
Well I'm glad that's settled.

Apparently today is some type of holiday? New cover of SI Swimsuit edition gets released tonight on Letterman. I'm gonna go watch 'Cuse inevitably shoot themselves in the foot against West Virginia.

"They say that nobody is perfect. Then they tell you practice makes perfect. I wish they'd make up their minds."
-Winston Churchill

For Tyers...
-DeFran



Sunday, February 13, 2011

And the beat goes on, and the beat goes on

So we have hit the two week mark in practice and things are starting to really flow. The younger guys are getting the hang of the drills, and how much fun 160's are.

For those of you that don't know, a "160" stands for 1 lap around our wonderful indoor track which measures out to about 160 yards or a tenth of a mile. As I write this however I just looked online and found out that a mile is 1,760 yards. A tenth of that is 176 yards which clearly isn't 160 yards but I guess 160 just rolls off the tongue better. Regardless of their exact measurement they are terrible. The only thing I can compare them to are a little workout we used to do during my high school wrestling years entitled "P.A.T.'s" which is short for Pain Agony and Torture. You get the idea.

On a side note, I'd like to personally thank whoever designed our field house for having the brilliant idea of putting a track inside. I understand we have a track team and they need to practice but I still will have some choice words for you if I ever meet you.

Saturday practices are always fun because we mix things up a bit and get away from the standard drills. This weekend we had the pleasure of welcoming assistant coach Ryan Cavanagh's girlfriend to practice. Wouldn't you know she has a background in personal training. Awesome.

All kidding aside we had a great hour of workouts before we got to have some fun. We really appreciate her coming out for the day to help us.

The real fun started when we broke up into two teams and scrimmaged. I have to give props to my housemate and midfielder "Seany Utah" Jaquin who had four goals I believe. Also sophomore Will "Todd Heap" Lehmann had a big day at the face off X. I know other people had good games but I can't think off the top of my head. In the end sophomore middie Tommy Kilderry scored the game winner. All in all it was a great time and nice way to end a tough week of practices.

We are creeping closer and closer to our season opener against West Conn on March 4 in Danbury,CT. Definitely looking forward to it as they always give us a tough game.

So I did a little exploring on this site and I found out I can actually see how many page views we have had. Well since our inception in the Spring of 2010 we have had 2,539 unique visits to the page. That's awesome! Personally I am shooting for 10 grand before I leave.

Here's the really cool part, I can actually see where the views are coming from. No, not literally, so don't worry about putting pants on. Now you would think a majority of those views are from America and you of course would be right, with the good ole U.S. of A. accounting for 2,153 views. That still leaves 386 unaccounted for views . Immediately I thought of this scene from "Rocket Man".


Who is our second biggest fan? Probably those crazy Canucks to the North right? Wrong. Germany comes in with 71 views. I love that. In my head there's a little kid eating a huge bratwurst with his lacrosse stick and a Plattsburgh Lacrosse t-shirt reading my blog everyday. The rest of the list goes as follows.

Canada: 53 (Obvious pick considering how close we are to them)
Russia: 48 (Moscow might be the only place worst than Plattsburgh in the winter)
United Kingdom: 30 (I'd bet my life savings that every one of these is by someone with the last name Tyers)
Netherlands: 27 (Sophomore Ryan Phillips played on their national team this summer)
Latvia: 21 (They drive on the right side of the road over there too!)
India: 18 (When your country has a trillion people you're bound to have some lax bros)
Italy: 18 (The good old mother country)
Brazil: 13 (IF YOU ARE A FEMALE BETWEEN THE AGES OF 18 AND 30 PLEASE CONTACT ME)

I found this all very interesting so anyone that is viewing the blog from another country besides America please contact me at d.j.defrancesco@gmail.com. I would love to hear how or why you are following Plattsburgh Lacrosse and I am sure the readers would to. Who knows maybe I can hook you up with something = ) .

Arcade Fire won the Grammy for album of the year. I am gonna sound like a complete hipster and arrogant music fan but, hey wait a minute, that name sounds familiar. Oh I know why, I posted their first single off that album on my first blog post of the year back in September. Don't believe me? Can I call em or can call em.

To our commrads in Mother Russia I leave you with this:
Karl Marx once served as a European correspondent for The New York Tribune.

"There are things known, and there are things unknown, And in between are the Doors"
Well said Jimmy
-DeFran






Monday, February 7, 2011

Hey everyone come see how good I look...

Shouts to redshirt junior and fellow housemate Tucker Glass for getting "Caught Being Good" honors from the NCAA. Check out the article here. The award could not going to a more deserving kid. Glass is not only El Presidente of SUNY Plattsburgh's Student Athletic Association Committee but also a member of the the Division III Student-Athlete Advisory Committee, one of only 24 student athletes in all of Division III. Hopefully this post will lead to Tucker being "Caught buying his housemate dinner".

Everyone cross their fingers that Melo comes to the Knicks.

For the record, the electric chair was invented by a dentist. So yeah theirs that too.

-DeFran

Sunday, February 6, 2011

Stock in Head & Shoulders will fall 30% tommorrow...

What a great game! Their is nothing quite like Super Bowl Sunday. I love sports, but I love the fact that people that don't know the difference between a touchdown and a goalpost still watch the Super Bowl. I know a lot of sports fanatics stick their noses up at bandwagon fans that only jump onto a team when they start doing well in the playoffs. Personally I say the more the merrier. Events like the Superbowl, the World Cup and the Olympics are great because people follow sports they might not normally.

The next best thing about the Super Bowl is obviously the commercial. It is probably the only sporting event where it is considered courteous to talk DURING the game as opposed to the commercials. I had a couple favorites:



Reasons why:
1.Referenced Star Wars
2.Sick costume
3.At :25 when his mom pushes the sandwich towards him in an attempt to pretend he has the force which he finds extremely disheartening
4.His final reaction upon the car turning on


I just think the interaction between the two friends is hilarious.

Well with the first week in the books I have to say I am really impressed with the teams effort thus far. It is still real early but it just feels like we have a good thing going. Their is always a good vibe in the locker room and I think everyone on the team really brings something to the table that can help us win. Although the team I drafted for Saturday's scrimmages went 1-2 we finished strong. I was happy with all my draft picks.

Hope you enjoyed our video of practice. We are gonna try to do a lot more of that stuff, especially on road trips to show you guys the behind the scenes of the team. Put 35 18 to 22 year-old's in a hotel room in a foreign city and funny things are bound to happen. Leave some comments of stuff you really wanna see and we can try and make it happen.

Also thought I'd mention again that we are running a Twitter account. Let me give you my 15 second spin on Twitter:

When Twitter first came out and people were freaking out about what type of salad dressing Ashton Kutcher was getting and how Paris Hilton likes her coffee I thought it was the stupidest thing ever. Why do I care what a bunch of celebrities are do. My interest still didn't peak even when the Twitter bug caught on in the sports world with athletes tweeting during halftime of their games. Then this past winter break while attending a basketball game with one of my good friends Andrew Luckie we had the following conversation:

Luckie: "Yo dude I got a twitter, its sick."
Me: "That's stupid, no one wants to know what you ate for dinner besides your mom."
Luckie: "Nah man, I don't actually tweet I just follow people, they say some funny stuff."
Me: "Does Ron Artest have a twitter account?"
Luckie: "Yes"
Me: "I'm in."

So for the month or so I used twitter as simply a way to follow some of my favorite athletes and monitor Ron Artest. Then I was in the shower the other day and I had this great idea. Why not use twitter to post scores and updates on our team! The blog is great and I will update it a lot but obviously I can't write a blog while we are on the way back from Oswego or St.Lawrence. I can access Twitter from my phone so it will be a way for me to post scores and what not quickly without having to write a full blog. So that's why I have a twitter. Check it out:

http://twitter.com/#!/therealdefran


What a legend.
-DeFran

Friday, February 4, 2011

Men's Lacrosse Begins Preparing for 2011

With students returning to campus after a long winter break, the men's lacrosse team has begun to get ready for the 2011 season. Practices began earlier this week, with the season opener set for March 4th at Western Connecticut State. Check out members of the team in their second practice of the year.



Couple things I love about this video:

1.Fellow roommate and senior Will Folgherait's camera angle when filming. Watch out James Cameron, theirs a new director on the block!

2.Sophmore Dan Field's running of the 40 yard dash. I could watch that all day. (He was clocked at a speedy 7.5 seconds)

3.Sophmore Brett McClelland absolutely lighting up freshman Frank Gargiulo at the 1:04 mark during Gennies.

4.Did you see that feed by that stud #34? Wow talk about a playmaker.

5.Head Coach P.J. Kavanagh explaining to freshman Charlie Dullea why he was stuffed by sophomore goalie Gordie Gehring.

6.160's!!!

First week has gone great. Had a my first career snow day on Wednesday. It's still early but the teams really starting to mold together.

Quick note: I made a twitter page! I'll try to keep you up to date on scores and whatnot. The tweets aren't private so you we'll be able to view them regardless of whether you have a twitter account or not. Check it out:

http://twitter.com/#!/therealdefran

Blake Griffin made the NBA All-Star team and apparently this isn't sitting well with certain people. I'm not gonna get into the fact that the man is a double double machine. I'll simply show you this:



I rest my case.


It's officially Saturday, which means it's the weekend! Every time I hear this song I think of the scene from "Heavyweights" when they are at the dance.
-DeFran