Men's Lacrosse Knocks off Fontbonne University in Season Opener
JACKSON, Miss. – The University of Dallas men's lacrosse team started the 2017 season with a victory on Saturday against Fontbonne University. It is also the first for head coach Sam Ashton in his career and at the start of a new era for Dallas (1-0). They won 8-5 over the Griffins (0-1) thanks to scoring six unanswered goals at one stretch to open an 8-2 lead early in the final quarter.
NOTABLE STATISTICS
(Individual Notes)
- Ben Blessard (Falls Church, Va.) earned his second career hat trick to lead the Dallas offense. He also added four groundballs.
- Peter Early (San Antonio, Texas) and Andrew Jones (Austin, Texas) both tallied multi-scoring games.
- Last year's leading scorer led the team in shots with six and had four on cage. Jones added three shots and groundballs in his first collegiate match.
- Tyler Smith (Snoqualmie, Wash.) owned the faceoff circle with 10-of-11 wins and also garnered 12 groundballs for a game-high.
- Christian Lopez (Las Vegas, Nev.) claimed his first collegiate win with a complete game in the net. He made 10 saves against five shots faced.
- Fontbonne was led offensively by Berlin Cole with three goals. He tied team-high in shots (6) with five on target.
- Jack Carroll also collected 10 saves in 60 minutes between the pipes.
(Team Notes)
- The Crusaders won first 10 faceoffs in a row through three quarters. Overall won 12 faceoffs in 15 opportunities.
- UD also held an advantage in shots 30-23 and groundballs 32-24.
- The Griffins did succeed with more clears (21-23) compared to Dallas (18-25).
- Dallas scored three goals in man-up opportunities.
HOW IT HAPPENED
The opposition drew first blood with Alex Kessel firing an unassisted goal with 10:26 left in the opening quarter. Jake Frederick (Coppell, Texas) evened the contest less than a minute later on his first collegiate point. Blessard tickled the twine at 7:32 to give Dallas its first edge and completed the scoring of the first frame.
The Griffins regained their final lead held five minutes in the next quarter was Cole. Matt Rech assisted on the equalizer goal. UD's Early got his first goal of the campaign with around seven minutes to go. The lead never was relinquished the remainder of the game, and Dallas posted six straight goals to take control of the momentum. At the end of the stanza, Jones scored on a pass from Smith to make it 4-2 at halftime.
It was all Dallas in the third quarter, as a trio of goals were notched. Blessard and Jones went back-to-back on man-up goals before Blessard secured his hat trick at 2:24 to make it 7-2. Early rounded out the scoring for the Crusaders with a goal a couple minutes in to the fourth.
Fontbonne rallied back with three straight goals over the remainder of the game. Two were man-up goals, including the final one about three minutes left by Cole. Bryan Nguyen assisted both man-up scores.
UP NEXT
Dallas faces host school Millsaps College on Sunday at noon.