SBU Sports: Men’s lacrosse upends unbeaten Fairfield, earls 15th ranked win in program history
Stony Brook men’s lacrosse outlasted No. 12 Fairfield, 17-16, on March 29 at LaValle Stadium, handing the NCAA’s last remaining unbeaten team its first loss of the season. Kian McCoy paced the offense with a career-high six points (three goals, three assists) while Jamison MacLachlan made a season-best 20 saves in cage.
The high-scoring contest featured a 10-goal first half, seeing Stony Brook take an early 5-1 lead.
The Seawolves led 6-4 after the opening 15 minutes of action. Six different Seawolves scored a goal in the frame.
Fairfield trailed by four goals early on but scored three of the final four goals of the quarter to trim the deficit to two goals.
A five-goal scoring run that spanned the final three-plus minutes of the first quarter and the first six minutes of the second stanza gave Fairfield its first lead of the afternoon, 7-6.
Brendan Marino snapped Stony Brook’s nearly 15-minute scoring drought with his second of the afternoon to even the score at 7-7. McCoy followed with his second of the contest to put the Seawolves back in front.
The Stags tallied a pair of goals to back ahead by one before Richie DeChiaro scored in the final minute to even the contest at 9-all heading into the intermission.
The lead continued changing hands in the second half. McCoy completed his hat trick to break the ice in the second half and put Stony Brook in front 10-9.
Fairfield notched back-to-back goals to make it 11-10 in favor of the nationally-ranked visitors.
The two sides entered the fourth quarter all even at 13 after Tanner Williams found the back of the net to complete the scoring in the third quarter.
Carson Boyle netted a man-up goal and Collin Williamson padded the Seawolves lead to two goals with one of his own early in the fourth.
Fairfield responded with two more tallies to tie it again, 15-15. MacLachlan held strong in net, stopping a pair of Fairfield shots and keeping it even as the contest entered the final five minutes.
MacLachlan caused a turnover with less than three minutes to play, intercepting a pass to the X. Stony Brook gained possession, cleared and called timeout to set the offense.
Ray O’Brien scored the go-ahead goal, unassisted, sneaking a shot inside, with help from the post, with 2:17 to play.
Robbie Smith won the ensuing face-off, leading to a Caleb Yeung unassisted goal to push the lead to two goals with 1:06 to play.
Smith won the next face-off as well, but Fairfield forced a turnover and scored with 20 seconds to play.
After a Fairfield timeout, the Stags went early on the face-off, giving what proved to be the final possession of the contest to Stony Brook. The Seawolves ran the clock out on their second ranked win of the season, and first in league play.
“I’m so proud of the guys, they played so hard. These last four weeks, we’ve practiced so hard and we’re in these one-goal games. It comes down to play here or there, and we talked all week about finishing. We broke every huddle with ‘finish’ the entire week and every huddle in game today and our guys just made one more play and that was the key,” head coach Anthony Gilardi said postgame.
Up next, the team hits the road to face Delaware on Saturday, April 5. The Seawolves and Blue Hens are set for a noon start in Newark with the contest streaming live on FloCollege.
