Second quarter surge pushes UAlbany Men’s Lacrosse to victory at Stony Brook
STONY BROOK — The UAlbany men’s lacrosse team rode strong days by Connor Fields and TD Ierlan to take a 19-11 victory at Stony Brook to stand 3-0 in the America East.
Scoring the last goal of the first quarter, UAlbany (8-1, 3-0 AE) shut out Stony Brook (5-4, 1-2 AE) 8-0 in the second quarter to lead by nine at the half, riding that advantage for the win on Long Island.
“We just finished a five-game stretch in two weeks, coming out 5-0 with four road wins,” said UAlbany head coach Scott Marr. “To play with that kind of energy tonight against a huge rival was outstanding, and I could not be more proud of the team’s effort, attitude and mental toughness tonight!”
With the win, UAlbany has won eight straight and has a half-game lead on Binghamton for first place in the America East.
Four different Great Danes notched hat tricks while Ierlan against dominated on faceoffs, going 26-for-30 (86.7%) with 20 ground balls, each career-highs. As a team, UAlbany outshot Stony Brook 47-30 and had 38 ground balls to SBU’s 16.
“I think we had a great gameplan coming in, and our wings did a great job of getting pressure off me,” said Ierlan. “Overall it was a good day.”
Fields led all offensive players with four goals and four assists for eight points. Bennett Drake, Sean Eccles and Justin Reh each had three goals while Kyle McClancy recorded two goals and two assists. JD Colarusso notched the victory with 11 saves in the opening 58:08.
“We were reading the defense and working together as a team,” said Fields. “We were getting open shots and our chemistry is getting a lot better.”
A couple of early turnovers forced by the home team defense led to SBU to score the first two goals of the game. With Ierlan continuing to win faceoffs, UAlbany kept getting chances: UAlbany got onto the board with a catch and shoot setup from Fields to McClancy. The ride assisted the next, with McClancy finding Drake on the break to tie it up. Minutes later, Lasda gave UAlbany the lead with a long range score in front of a defender to make it 3-2 with 4:12 left in the 1st.
In the closing minute of the first quarter, Alex Corpolongo scored on a run to the cage to even the score. UAlbany scored 10 seconds left off a won faceoff from Ierlan, leading McClancy to spin off a defender and score on a heater to the cage. UAlbany led 4-3 after one.
The ride helped again for a goal as John Glancy forced a turnover at the mid-line, seeing Jakob Patterson score on the putback. UAlbany continued to attack, even when man-down as Adam Osika scored quickly after a clear. UAlbany added another as Fields used a screen from Jack Burgmaster to shake two defenders and score close range to make it 7-3 with 8:06 left in the 2nd.
UAlbany went on a blitz and scored four goals in the span of 70 seconds. A Fields high pass pulled down by Drake for the shot and score, a Lasda run off a won Ierlan faceoff, a Fields spinning move to score on the doorstep and an Ierlan goal five seconds after a won faceoff. UAlbany added one more goal in the half, a shovel pass from Osika to Eccles for a hard shot and score, completing an 8-0 run and giving UAlbany a 12-3 lead at the half.
SBU scored first in the early part of the 3rd, then UAlbany got it back with another long range shot and score from Eccles. The Seawolves scored the next four goals to pull within five at 13-8. UAlbany got another late quarter goal, a Patterson goal after faking out a defender, to make it 14-8 after three.
UAlbany’s offense got back into gear to begin the fourth quarter, with Eccles adding a frozen rope goal and Fields scoring on a ground ball shot with a defender faceguarding him. Minutes later, Drake added another as UAlbany led 17-8, 9:07 left.
UAlbany added two more goals in the closing minutes, with a long range heave and score from Fields and Lasda swimming out of a double team in the middle of the field and scoring on his own. SBU had two late goals as UAlbany took the victory 19-11.
UAlbany will have a week before its next game as the Great Danes host UMBC at John Fallon Field on Saturday, April 8th at 1 p.m.
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