Nazareth Secures Top Seed; Ithaca & Stevens to Battle for No. 2
Nazareth clinched the Empire 8 Conference regular-season title in men's lacrosse with a 13-8 victory over St. John Fisher Wednesday night. Ithaca upended visiting Elmira, 22-2, to improve to 5-1 in league action and two-way tie with Stevens. The Bombers and Ducks will play each other on April 27, with the winner earning the No. 2 seed in the tournament. Fisher and Utica will battle for the fourth seed in the tournament on Saturday.
NAZARETH v ST. JOHN FISHER
Freshman Luke Wooters scored six goals and junior Collin Clark scored three times with one assist to lead Nazareth to a 13-8 victory over St. John Fisher at Growney Stadium.
Nazareth improved to 11-4 overall with its fifth straight win. The Golden Flyers are 6-0 in conference play. It was their 11th victory over the Cardinals in 12 overall meetings. Fisher dropped to 10-5 overall and 3-3 in the E8.
It marked the third six-goal game of the season for Wooters, who has a team-best 45 for the season to go with 61 points. In addition to Wooters and Clark,
Trevar Haefele scored two goals and added an assist and his brother
Troy Haefele had a goal and three assists. Junior
Chris Aycock also scored a goal.
Nazareth led 3-2 after one quarter and then scored five goals in a three-minute stretch of the second quarter to go up 8-2 and were in control the rest of the way.
ITHACA v ELMIRA
Twelve Bombers tallied goals in the 22-2 win against Elmira as Ithaca recorded its fourth consecutive victory to improve to 5-1 in league action. Ithaca powered to a 5-0 lead in the first and held a 10-0 margin at the half. Ithaca owned a 16-0 lead at 7:06 of the third. In the third, the Bombers scored nine goals, while the Soaring Eagles netted both of their scores. Ithaca added three in the final frame.
Freshman
Scott Sidnam (Camillus, N.Y./West Genesee) made eight stops in 45 minutes in goal and senior
Andrew Landsman (Norwalk, Conn./Brien McMahon) made three saves during the final 15.
Ithaca outshot Elmira, 41-27, held a 49-30 gap in ground balls and won 18 of 26 faceoffs.
STEVENS v HARTWICK
Nine different players scored goals and six had multiple points as the 11th-ranked Stevens Institute of Technology men’s lacrosse team moved to 11-3 overall and 5-1 in the Empire 8 with a 19-11 win over Hartwick College Wednesday night at the De Baun Athletic Complex.
Senior midfielder Nicholas Phillippi started a 10-goal first half for the Ducks less than one minute into the action, and after the Hawks tied the game at one apiece, markers from freshman midfielder Zachary Raposo and senior midfielder Rich Dupras gave the Ducks a 3-1 edge.
Hartwick closed the gap to one, but Stevens ran off three-straight tallies to bridge the first and second quarters, opening up a 6-2 lead with 14:14 to play in quarter number two.
Hartwick notched a pair, fighting back within two (6-4), but the Ducks rang the bell four-straight times to push their lead to 10-4 and eventually settled on a five-goal margin at the intermission.
Philippi started the third much like the first to get the Stevens lead back to six, but the Hawks did not go down quietly, getting a pair close within four with 10:22 to play in the quarter.
For the next 11:11 of game time it was all Stevens as the Ducks sealed the win, scoring six of the game’s next seven tallies to open a 17-8 lead with 10:49 on the clock.
The Stevens ride made a major difference in this game as Hartwick converted just 7-of-21 clears, and the man-down unit kept Hartwick at a 2-for-7 conversion rate. The Ducks earned a 44-40 margin in ground balls and a 56-32 edge in shots, also finishing the game plus-17 in turnovers (26-9).
UTICA v HAMILTON
The Utica College men's lacrosse team led 5-3 late in the third quarter but visiting Hamilton College rallied with seven unanswered goals in the third and fourth quarters to earn a 10-5 victory in the third annual Contineer Cup on Wednesday night. UC senior
Ben Winkler (Rodman, NY/IHC) netted a team-high three goals to pace the Pioneers. Utica (8-6, 3-3 Empire 8) will take on St. John Fisher College in Empire 8 Conference action on Saturday with a bid into the coveted conference tournament hanging in the balance.
Utica's
Justin Edelstein (Hartsdale, NY/Harvey School) and
Trent Jacobs (Hogansburg, NY/Brewster Academy) also added two goals for the Pioneers, who are just one win shy of setting a new program record for wins in a single season.
Hamilton improved to 9-6 overall as three different Continentals netted at least two goals. Connor Morgan led the way with three goals, while Bryan Hopper and Luke Walsh each tallied a pair. All three of Morgan's goals came consecutively, as he netted the Continentals final goal of the third quarter as well as their first two goals of the fourth.
The Pioneers led 5-3 after Winkler scored his 37th of the season with 2:41 left in the third quarter, but just ten seconds later Morgan put the Continentals on his back to guide them to victory. All three of Morgan's goals came in a span of 8:33 to give Hamilton a 6-5 lead with 8:57 to go in the contest.
The visitors never looked back from that point forward as Hopper, Walsh, John Zimmerman and Ryan McCausland each scored in the fourth quarter to help the Continentals earn the five goal victory.