BETHLEHEM, PA – NJIT men's lacrosse dropped a 13-8 loss to Lehigh on Saturday afternoon at Frank Banko Field.
The Highlanders (0-1) made vast improvement from last year notching their best performance against the Mountain Hawks (1-0) in their three years of competition falling 21-4 in 2016 and 15-5 in 2017.
"No one is ever happy about losing a game," head coach
Travis Johnson said, "we are looking to get better every day and compete at the highest level we are capable of. Playing 14 freshmen and sophomores of the 23 players today was a great
experience that we can learn from, and use this game against a very good Lehigh team and get better from it."
NJIT received five goals from five different members, two of them being freshman. Juniors
Cole Robillard and
Ryan Darrow each produced two goals and an assist each, while
Aaron Forster added two goals himself.
Freshman
Nicholas Irwin tallied his first and second collegiate assists while
Colton Johnson and
Max Wilson each scored their first collegiate goals.
Starting off the season strong, senior captain
Nick Marzullo made 16 saves in the loss, and James Spence made nine saves for Lehigh earning the win while Colin Kirst also saw some time in net.
Lehigh was led by Andrew Pettit who earned five points on three goals and two assists, followed by Mickey Fitzpatrick who also had a hat trick. Senior captain Ian Strain added three assists on the day, while John Mehok had two goals and one assist and Tristan Rai one goal and two assists.
The game was close going into halftime, with the Highlanders trailing by only one, 6-5.
Lehigh went up 2- 0 in the first quarter before NJIT answered back with a goal by Robillard off a pass from Irwin.
The Mountain Hawks added another goal from Lucas Spence but the Highlanders capitalized off a bad pass and launched down the field for a counter attack. Freshman Irwin found fellow freshman Johnson to put the Highlanders back within one goal.
Darrow scored an unassisted goal to tie the game up for NJIT and ending the first quarter.
Starting off the second quarter Darrow connected with Robillard who scored from 10 yards out giving the Highlanders the lead.
Mickey Fitzpatrick scored his first goal of the game tying is back up at 4-4 and the Highlanders tried to get it back with heavy attack, first a shot by Robillard that was stopped by goalie James Spence, picked up by Forster who tried to tuck it away but
was stopped point blank.
The Highlanders allowed another three goals before Forster came around the crease and shot a low ball past the keeper in the last 15 seconds of the third for the 6-5 score into halftime.
In the third quarter the Mountain Hawks grew their lead, scoring five goals to the Highlanders one, an unassisted goal by Darrow.
Each team added on two goals in the final quarter, with Wilson and Forster earning NJIT's last two goals.
Men's lacrosse hosts another Pennsylvania based team, Lafayette on February 10. The game starts at 11:30am at Drew University, the Highlanders home for the 2018 season. The first 100 fans will receive either an NJIT beanie, NJIT gloves or an NJIT scarf!
