By Ryan McCord
The second ranked Hofstra men’s lacrosse team began it’s much anticipated post-season on Wednesday night as the Villanova Wildcats paid a visit to Shuart Stadium with a trip to the conference championship game at stake.
Thanks to senior attack man Chris Unterstein’s five points and Athan Iannucci’s record-setting night, the Pride was able to overcome an early 2-2 tie along with heavy rain that saturated field conditions. Hofstra ran away with a 13-4 victory and reserved a spot to play for all the CAA marbles on Saturday night, when it will host Delaware.
Iannucci netted his most significant hat trick of the season (4 goals, 1 assist), as he now owns the Pride’s single-season goal scoring record with 53, breaking Tom Kessler’s previous high of 51 set in 2001.
Kevin Unterstein helped make the necessary clears and added six ground balls to his team-leading total of 74, while senior co-captains Brett Moyer and John Orsen played instrumental parts defensively for a Pride team that broke the school’s single-season record for wins, at 15 and counting.
“It was just a matter of figuring a team out offensively, sticking with what our coaches tell us and sticking to our game plan defensively.” Orsen said.
Joe Mascaretti was business as usual in his face-off performance for the Pride, winning an eye-popping 20 of 21 attempts, helping his offense control possession and outscoring the Wildcats 4-0 in what turned out to be a decisive second period.
“Hofstra demonstrated not only tonight, but all season long that they are a legit, Final Four team,” said Villanova head coach Randy Marks, whose team finished with a 5-10 record in 2006. “Very athletic, probably the best team I have seen come out of this conference in the five years that we’ve been playing [in the CAA]. Coach Danowski should be very proud of his team. It would be fun to see Hofstra and Virginia [meet] in Philadelphia.”
Villanova was led offensively by senior middy Matt Starker, who registered a hat-trick of his own in defeat. Senior goalkeeper Joe Canuso had his work cut out for him, watching the Pride offense take 37 total shots through three periods alone and saving 15 to set the school’s all-time career save mark (672) in his last game.
“That’s probably one of the best offenses I’ve seen,” Canuso said. “They have shooters everywhere, they have a guy that can get them the ball…they’re good.”
Not only was Hofstra able to outshoot the Wildcats by an overwhelming margin (43-19), but were able to control the groundball total (39-17) as well. Hofstra also caused 19 turnovers, as Orsen led the way with three.
Three-time CAA Rookie of the Week award-winner Tommy Dooley and fellow freshman Mike Colleluori both netted two goals, and sophomore midfielder Mike Unterstein added three points to help a Pride team that, according to its head coach, is well aware of the team’s ultimate expectations.
“There’s not a sense of jubilation or accomplishment. For the modern day Division I lacrosse player there’s one goal and one goal only. What I do feel is that there’s something greater that they want to accomplish,” said Danowski, who is leading the Pride to its first CAA conference title game since 2003. “Right now our focus is certainly on playing and competing in a championship game against a team that probably needs to win [to make the NCAA’s].”
The 2006 CAA tournament champion will be crowned at Shuart Stadium on Saturday, with opening faceoff set for 7:30 p.m.. The Pride won the first meeting of the season, narrowly defeating the Fightin’ Blue Hens 12-10 on April 14 in Newark, Del.