By Justin Paley
The Pride men’s lacrosse team’s streak of 25 wins over unranked opponents came to an end on Sunday with a 6-3 loss to University of Massachusetts.
The Minutemen struck quickly as Chris Doyle put his team up 1-0 only 52 seconds into the game. UMass went up 2-0 when Ryan Connolly scored with 6:55 left in the first quarter.
The Pride, who did not get off a shot until 14 minutes left in the second quarter against Notre Dame on March 24, took 14 shots in the first quarter against UMass. Only one found its way into the back of the net as sophomore attackman Chris Unterstein found sophomore attackman Ryan Lucas, cutting the deficit in half with 2:53 to play in the first. Minutemen goalie Bill Schell was outstanding, making 13 saves including five in the first quarter.
Pride sophomore goalie Matt Southard kept the Blue and Gold in the game in the second quarter, making seven of his 17 total saves. However, UMass’ Kevin Glenz found teammate Matt Tundo who slipped it past Southard 7:57 into the second quarter to go up 3-1. The Pride answered with 1:08 left until halftime when sophomore middie Tim Treubig scored his team leading 12 goal of the year, as the Pride went into the locker room down 3-2.
UMass used a three goal third quarter to take control. Neil Lundberg gave UMass a 4-2 lead with 11 minutes left in the third quarter. Four minutes later with the Pride’s Brett Moyer in the penalty box for a slash, Doyle scored his second goal of the game. Then 2:17 later, Tony Ventiquattro gave the Minutemen their final goal of the game.
With five minutes left in the third, Pride senior middie Don Scott scored his first goal of the season to cut the deficit to 6-3. Scott is one of four seniors on the Pride roster but Pride head coach John Danowski feels no one has assumed a leadership role.
“No one has. You can’t make someone be what they’re not and sophomores aren’t ready to lead,” Danowski said. “We’d like them to lead, [but also] we’d like juniors who just transferred in to lead. We only have four seniors and Jeremy Krykostas has been out the last few weeks (high ankle sprain) so only three seniors are playing.”
Danowski added that “none of those three seniors have been here four years. Brian Zuchelli and Keith Mekeel have been here three years and Don Scott has been here one and a half years. There’s nothing we can do about that and we have to live through it.”
The UMass defense was outstanding in the fourth quarter in holding the Pride scoreless and to the Pride’s lowest offensive output since a 6-2 loss to Army in 1997.
Coach Danowski gave credit to the UMass defense. “I thought there were some terrific individual players. We had 32 shots in three quarters against Notre Dame and we score 11 goals. We had 33 shots against UMass and scored three goals. It’s a fine line between being successful and not. Sometimes it’s a matter of finishing the ball and making shots and sometimes not. If we score two more and are up 3-2 at the end of the first, does it change how we play, do we relax, not press as much. That’s something that makes sports a lot of fun because you don’t know,” Danowski said.
When the USILA Coaches Poll was released on Monday, the Pride was not in it for the first time since Mar. 19, 2001.
Freshman attackman Athan Ianucci has been solid for the Pride, scoring nine goals. But Unterstein, Lucas, and sophomore Ryan Miller, have struggled, combining for 12 goals. Danowski still has confidence in his attack.
“If you watch how the game is being played now, attackmen from Virginia are not dominating who are All-Americans,” Danowski said. “Teams play good defense and kind of negate attackmen. I think our attackmen are capable and I just think they need to play and I believe in them and think it will be matter of time.”
With a four game losing streak and a young team, Danowski has to find a way to keep its confidence up.
“It’s not easy because the bottom line is winning is the thing that makes you confident and being successful so what you do is pick out things you can get better at and what we are improving on. I thought we improved tremendously on team defense from Notre Dame to UMass,” Danowski said. “We are making small improvements in the face-off game. Young individuals are gaining experience. We tell them they played three games in eight days against ranked opponents. They handled it very well and right now they didn’t win. Sometimes you have to learn how to lose before you learn how to win and I think that’s what we are trying to emphasize.”
Ironically, the last unranked team the Pride lost to before UMass was the University of Delaware in 2000. The roles are now reversed as the Pride is unranked as the Blue Hens are No. 18 in this week’s USILA poll. The two teams begin conference play against each other on Saturday as the Pride wraps up a four game road trip. Delaware has a surprising 7-2 record but has not won any games in its two years in the CAA.

Men’s Lax losing streak hits four