No. 12 Men's Lacrosse Falls to NYIT in Triple Overtime, 9-8
Box Score OLD WESTBURY, N.Y. (Apr. 19, 2014) - In its final regular-season road game of 2014, the 12th-ranked LIU Pot men's lacrosse team dropped a heartbreaking 9-8 triple-overtime decision to No. 7 NYIT in an East Coast Conference tilt Saturday at Presidents' Stadium in Old Westbury, N.Y.
Tied 1-1 late into the first quarter, the Bears (10-3, 7-1 ECC) scored four of the final five goals in the opening 30 minutes of play to carry a 5-2 lead into halftime. Junior attacker Luke Miller (Mastic, N.Y.) netted a pair of unassisted tallies. He finished the game with a four-point effort (2 G, 2 A). Sophomore attackman Shawn Murphy (Holbrook, N.Y.), who tallied a game-best five points (4 G, 1 A), had a goal and an assist.
Early in the third period, Pioneers' (6-5, 5-2 ECC) graduate attackman/midfielder
Joe Costello (Minneapolis, Minn.) and sophomore attackman
Ryan Slane (North Babylon, N.Y.) scored just 1:10 apart to close the gap to 5-4 at the 9:02 mark. From there, the two squads went back-and-forth, trading goals, until the final two-plus minutes of regulation.
Trailing 8-6 with more than two minutes remaining in the fourth quarter, Costello found the back of the cage on an unassisted effort to make it a one-score contest. Less than a minute later, junior attackman
Chris Caiazza (Lindenhurst, N.Y.) notched the equalizing marker to force overtime.
In the first extra session, Caiazza and sophomore attackman
Matty Beccaris (North Babylon, N.Y.) had shot attempts that were saved by NYIT's Alex Seltzer (Plainview, N.Y.). Then, in the seocnd overtime, sophomore midfielder
Anthony Berardis (Mahopac, N.Y.) cranked a shot off the crossbar, which kept the game alive.
Murphy would eventually win it for the Bears in the third overtime period, beating graduate goalie
T.J. DiCarlo (Farmingdale, N.Y.) with 2:26 left.
Caiazza and Slane totaled three points (2 G, 1 A) apiece to lead the green and gold on the afternoon. Caiazza also scooped up four ground balls and caused one turnover. Costello and Beccaris chipped in two goals each. Beccaris racked up five ground balls as well. Senior defenseman
T.J. McAndrew (Randolph, N.J.) and junior midfielder
Connor Drost (Wading River, N.Y.) both totaled four ground balls and one caused turnover.
Between the pipes, DiCarlo made 15 saves for LIU Post. His counterpart, Seltzer, stopped 18 shots for NYIT.
Overall, the Pioneers owned a 50-37 advantage in shots and a 37-36 edge in ground balls. In addition, the visitors were 25-of-29 (86.2 percent) on clears and 1-of-3 (33.3 percent) on extra-man opportunities.
Head Coach
John Jez and his LIU Post squad close out the 2014 regular season next Saturday (Apr. 26), when they host ECC rival Dowling at Hickox Field in Brookville, N.Y. The opening faceoff is set for noon.