DOBBS FERRY, N.Y. – In a battle for the East Coast Conference regular season championship, the No. 5 LIU Post men's lacrosse team suffered a 13-10 setback to No. 9 Mercy College on the road on Saturday, April 20.
 
Sophomore William Snelders led LIU Post with three goals, while freshman Jake Gillis and junior Mike Kadnar found the back of the net twice. Senior Connor Farrell finished 20-for-25 on faceoffs, collecting a game-high 15 ground balls. Defensively, senior Bryan Ochs made nine saves, but it was not enough to slow down the Maverick attack.
 
The Green and Gold outshot Mercy by a 45-32 margin and held a 40-29 edge in ground balls.
 
Snelders gave LIU Post an early lead just over two minutes into the contest before Mercy stormed back with three unanswered goals to take a 3-1 lead midway through the opening period. LIU Post leveled the scoring with Snelders' second tally of the day and a goal by redshirt-junior Thomas Liantonio. The two sides traded goals late in the first quarter and entered the first break tied, 4-4.
 
The Mavericks took control during the second stanza, scoring the first four goals to take an 8-4 lead before senior Frank Ranfone found the back of the net with 61 seconds before halftime. LIU Post entered the halftime intermission trailing 8-5 and despite tallying three unanswered goals during the third quarter, could only cut the deficit to two goals (11-9). Mercy added two more goals during the final period and held the Pioneers to just one goal as the Mavericks earned the victory to improve to 5-0 in ECC play, while dropping LIU Post to 4-1 in conference play.
 
The Pioneers close out their regular season on Saturday, April 27 when they host Seton Hill University in the final ECC-GMAC Challenge game of the 2018-19 season. LIU Post will honor its eight graduating student-athletes on Senior Day, with faceoff set for 1:30 p.m.