NASHUA, N.H. — The Wheaton College (Mass.) men's lacrosse team was defeated by host Rivier University, 10-7, this evening at Merrill Field in Nashua, N.H.
The Raiders improve to 1-0 following their season opener, while the Lyons suffer their first loss to dip to 2-1.
The teams matched each other in every quarter with goals, except for the pivotal second quarter that saw Rivier's defense hold Wheaton without a score, while the offense netted three unanswered markers to provide the difference in the match.
The Raiders held a slight 31-29 shot margin, but showed their determination with a 33-21 advantage in ground balls. Each team won 10 faceoffs in the contest.
Junior attacker Emmett Edwards (Sunderland, Vt.) led the Lyons with four goals to go with a ground ball and a caused turnover, while senior midfielder Mike McClaughlin (Stoughton, Mass.) collected three points, including the 100th point of his career, with a goal and a pair of assists in addition to a pair of caused turnovers. Junior attacker Charlie Goodrich (Fairfield, Conn.) contributed with a goal and an assist and senior midfielder Charlie Racine (Oradell, N.J.) netted a goal to go with three ground balls and a caused turnover. Junior defender Pason Fielding (Carlisle, Mass.) picked up six ground balls and caused two turnovers and sophomore Chris Bodnaruk (Andover, Mass.) won 10 of 19 face-offs, while adding three ground balls. Senior goalie Connor Almstrom (Cumberland, R.I.) made 11 saves.
Rivier graduate student attacker Connor Eck (Franklin, Mass.) scored a game-high five goals in addition to picking up four ground balls and senior middie Chris Heitmiller (Nashua, N.H.) found the back of the net four times in addition to a pair of assists and three ground balls. Senior midfielder Sawyer Hall (Windham, N.H.) scored a goal, picked up four ground balls and caused a turnover, while graduate student defender Adam Hailey (Salem, N.H.) picked up four ground balls and caused three turnovers. Junior Owen McDuffie (Gray, Maine) won nine of 17 draws and scooped up a pair of ground balls. Graduate student keeper Sawyer Gagnon (Gorham, Maine) turned away 11 shots for the Raiders.
The teams were tied at 3-3 after one quarter of play, before Rivier scored all three goals of the second quarter. Eck tallied the final marker of the opening quarter to pull the Raiders even before Heitmiller scored twice and Eck once with the only goals of the second period to give the home team a 6-3 lead. Heitmiller tallied the first goal of the third quarter for the fifth straight Rivier goal to give the Raiders a 7-3 advantage with 6:10 to go in the period.
Wheaton matched Rivier's only score of the quarter with its own coming on a marker from Edwards to cut the deficit to 7-4 with 5:17 showing in the period.
Eck opened the fourth quarter with a Raiders' tally coming 2:43 into the period, but Goodrich countered at 12:05 to make it 8-5, in what became a back-and-forth for the remainder of the game. Rivier couldn't pull away and the Lyons couldn't close the gap with each team matching the other. Eck scored, before McLaughlin matched him with his 100th career point on a goal at the 7:18 mark of the quarter. Heitmiller and Edwards exchanged scores to end the match.
Wheaton scored the first two goals of the match behind scores from Edwards and Racine, before the Raiders came right back with two goals of their own, courtesy of Hall and Eck to knot the game at 2-2 with 5:50 showing on the first quarter clock.
Edwards and Eck traded goals to keep the score tied at 3-3 going into the second quarter.
The Lyons return to play on Saturday, March 1 when they travel to Castine, Maine to take on Maine Maritime Academy at 3:00 p.m., while Rivier heads to Newton, Mass. on the same day for a 1:00 p.m. Great Northeast Athletic Conference contest with Lasell University at 1:00 p.m.
