Wins for Elmira, Nazareth and Stevens

4/1/2015 9:18:00 PM

NAZARETH 17, Utica 1
Nazareth defeated visiting Utica 17-1 in a men's Empire 8 Conference lacrosse game on Wednesday afternoon. Junior Troy Haefele amassed 10 points on six goals and four assists, and he has 14 goals and eight assists in the Golden Flyers' last three games. Nazareth received goals from 10 additional players to overwhelm the Pioneers' defense. The Golden Flyers' stingy defense had a scoreless streak of 69 minutes and 53 seconds spanning the end of the game against Elmira on March 28th and most of the first three quarters on Wednesday.

The first 10:28 of Wednesday's contest was scoreless before the Golden Flyers found the back of the net three times in a span of 2:17. Junior Luke Wooters set up the first two goals, one pass going to Haefele and another going to classmate Matt O'Neill. Senior Matt McDermott scored the third goal on the man-up opportunity after receiving a pass from Haefele.

In the second quarter, the Golden Flyers took command with nine goals in a span of just over nine minutes. Nazareth's scoring run was aided by penalties by the Pioneers, who had three penalties in the period, including a two-minute non-releasable infraction. Senior Will Fallo started the run, which was followed by a man-up goal from sophomore Joe Eiskant. Less than a minute after Eiskant's goal, Wooters found the back of the net after receiving a pass from Haefele. With just under six minutes left in the half, sophomore Luke Longo scored his fourth goal of the season to put Nazareth up 7-0. Haefele tallied the next four Golden Flyers' goals, including three during Nazareth's two-minute man-up opportunity. Wooters and Eiskant each had a pair of assists on Haefele's scores. In the final minute of the period, junior Dan O'Brien stretched the Golden Flyers' lead to 12-0 after collecting a pass from sophomore Hunter Burdick.

Less than two minutes into the third, Burdick found Haefele for his sixth goal of the game and 25th of the season. Burdick scored an unassisted goal, his sixth score of the season, roughly two minutes later. Wooters and freshman Paul Walter also scored to extend Nazareth's lead to 16 goals. With 51 seconds to play in the third, Ryan Desveaux put Utica on the board with a man-up goal. It was his 12th of the season, which ranks second on the Pioneers' team.

In the fourth quarter, Nazareth freshman Nick Rodin recorded his first-career goal. Junior Connor McKercher was credited with the assist for his fifth point of the season.

The Golden Flyers' powerful attack was helped again by Drew Simoneau's proficiency on faceoffs. Entering the game ranked fourth nationally in faceoff winning percentage at .725, the senior won 13-16 faceoffs (.813) on Wednesday. Simoneau also entered Wednesday ranked in the top-five in ground balls collected at 9.0 per game. He finished with a game-high 10 ground balls against the Pioneers. Simoneau has 895 career faceoff victories and 684 career ground balls.

Nazareth dominated Utica in all statistical categories. Nazareth had advantages in shots (47-16), ground balls (35-20), faceoff wins (15-5), and forced 25 turnovers. Senior Jerry Chasteen and Longo combined to force seven turnovers.

Sophomore Michael Cuciti played the first 50:17 in Nazareth's net and made five saves to earn the victory. Freshman Rick Kronenwett saw action between the pipes in the final 10 minutes and was credited with four saves. Andrew DiOrio played 58:26 and amassed 15 saves while allowing 16 of Nazareth's goals. Kobi Johnson replaced DiOrio temporarily in the first quarter after DiOrio was whistled for a cross-check. While Johnson held the Golden Flyers scoreless during the man-up chance, Nazareth scored its second goal before DiOrio could return to the field.


ELMIRA 14, Houghton 7
The Elmira College men's lacrosse team (2-5, 1-2 E8) scored 10 second-half goals en route to a 14-7 victory over Houghton College (1-7, 0-3 E8) today. TJ Leach '16 led the Soaring Eagles to their first Empire 8 Conference win this season with a career-high five goals and added an assist while Wyatt Katsos '17 made five saves in between the pipes.
 
Attribute EC's success to their ability to get shots off, as they outshot Houghton 57-28 today. The Purple and Gold's 57 total shots, 39 of which were on target, more than doubles the previous season-high of 26 done twice this season.
 
Despite dominating in shots in the first quarter, 16-3, the Purple and Gold found themselves trailing Houghton, 2-1 after 15 minutes of play. Anthony LaRusso '17 scored the EC men's goal in the first with Eric Hallman '15 being credited with the assist on the play.
 
Hallman tied the game up at 2-2 just 44 seconds into the second quarter. However, four minutes into the quarter the Highlanders would capitalize on a man-up opportunity to regain the 3-2 lead. Skyler Pradelski '15 found the back of the net with 3:54 left in the second quarter to tie the game up at 3-3. Houghton responded by scoring 35 seconds later to get back on top, 4-3. With 51 seconds left in the half, Pradelski found Hallman who was able to deadlock the game once more, this time at 4-4. However, the Highlanders would net one more goal with just 29 seconds left in the half to re-take the lead, 5-4. With nine seconds left in the half, Houghton committed two penalties, a technical and a personal, to give Elmira a two-man advantage heading into halftime.
 
After Houghton killed off the first technical penalty and with nine seconds remaining the personal penalty, Hallman would receive the ball from Leach and scored the man-up goal to tie the game up at five apiece. Nevin Olney '18 scored 2:03 seconds into the third quarter to give Elmira their first lead of the game, 6-5.
 
1:36 later, Pradelski found LaRusso who scored his second goal of the game to put Elmira up, 7-5. Elmira dictated the play for the remaining of the quarter as EC outshot Houghton, 19-5 and scored four more goals to lead 11-5 at the end of the third quarter. Leach scored two of the goals while Pradelski and PJ Tessier '17 also found the back of the net for the Soaring Eagles in the quarter.
 
Leach scored another goal 2:20 seconds into the fourth quarter to give the Soaring Eagles a seven goal, 12-5, lead. Houghton capitalized on another man-up opportunity 1:13 later and then scored again with 3:17 left in regulation time to cut EC's lead to 12-7. Leach closed the door on any comeback hopes from the Highlanders by scoring two more goals before the end of the game to give Elmira a 14-7 win. Pradelski and John Bigelow '16 were credited with assists on the final two scoring plays of the game.


STEVENS 15, Hartwick 7
The Stevens Institute of Technology men's lacrosse team saw seven different players score Wednesday in a dominating 15-7 win over Hartwick College.
 
The win evened Stevens' record at 5-5 while Hartwick fell to 0-6.
 
Freshman Tommy Dawson paced the Ducks with a career high five goals while junior Andrew Scrutchfied added three goals and three assists. Junior Connor O'Shea and sophomore Connor McKeon each added multiple goals, and sophomore Kevin Rafferty made four saves in net.
 
Stevens dominated the attack, besting Hartwick 45-20 while forcing 21 turnovers.
 
Scruthchfield got the Ducks on the board early with a goal in the first three minutes followed by a score from sophomore Ryan Giordano less than two minutes later. The Hawks inched close with a pair of goals over the last six minutes of the opening quarter, but two straight from the Ducks to start the second put Stevens up 6-2.
 
Hartwick controlled play briefly from there with a pair of man-up goals to pull to within two before Dawson ended the run with a goal off a pass from junior Matt Ferentini. Scrutchfield followed up with a goal in the closing seconds of the half off a feed from junior Colin Sawula to send the Ducks into the break up 8-4.
 
The second half was dominated by the Ducks from the start after senior Michael Maroon and Scrutchfield extended the lead to six with one goal each over the first five minutes. After going scoreless over the next eight minutes, the Ducks broke the game open with a trio of goals over the final three minutes to go up 13-4.
 
McKeon added a man-up goal in the early minutes of the fourth before Hartwick attempted a comeback with a pair of goals with under three minutes to go. The goals were not nearly enough however as Ferentini put an exclamation point on the win with a man-up score off a pass from freshman JP Southren in the closing seconds.

Cortland 11, ITHACA 10 (OT)

Union 19, ST. JOHN FISHER 12 

Standings as of April 1

SCHOOL	CONF	OVERALL
Ithaca	3-0	8-3
Nazareth	3-0	8-2
Alfred	2-1	8-1
St. John Fisher	1-1	5-4
Stevens	1-1	5-5
Utica	1-1	6-3
Elmira	1-2	2-5
Hartwick	0-3	0-5
Houghton	0-3	1-7