Men’s Lacrosse: Freshmen Lead Terriers to Season Opening Victory
By: Marisa Ingemi
Photo by Madeline Horner
The Boston University men’s lacrosse team surrendered just five goals to the Providence College Friars in a 9-5 victory from Nickerson Field to open the season. James Burr, a freshman, scored twice in his collegiate debut and the team’s leading scorer from 2015 Jack Wilson also found the back of the net twice.
Sam Talkow won 16 out of the 18 faceoffs he took and he scored one goal off of the faceoff. BU dominated the possession game, with Providence getting off only 19 shots in comparison to 46 for the Terriers. Providence did come back late in the game, scoring four of their goals in the second half and three of them coming in the fourth quarter.
The Terriers were held scoreless in the fourth quarter until rookie long pole defenseman Drew Lukacs scored with less than two minutes to play to seal the victory. Until that point, the fourth quarter had been dominated by the Friars with three goals and several penalties taken by the Terriers.
“They came back and made it interesting,” said BU head coach Ryan Polley. “We have to clear the ball, we can’t be as careless with the ball.”
Lukacs was just one Terrier freshman to stand out, as Burr scored his two goals, including the first goal of the contest, and defenseman Quintin Germain made his first career start and was a cog defensivley.
“Drew is just that freak athlete that can make plays in the middle of the field,” said Polley. “Sam [Talkow] made a play when he was being pushed out of bounds, he kind of desperation threw it to him and it happened to go right to Drew, he made a great shot.”
Dominick Calisto took on the challenge of covering Will Mazzone, the leading point getter of the Friars last season. Mazzone did score twice, but one of the tallies came from behind the net when Caslisto was not covering him.
“Mazzone is a smaller guy,” Caslisto said. “You dont see a lot of guys like that, he’s quick. I had the chance to play against him when he was at Army, and last year again when we played Providence. I watched a lot of film on him and knew his tendencies.”
“When Dom puts his mind to it, he can be a great cover guy.” said Polley. “I think it was a great matchup for Dom and he did a great job on him. He beat him to spots a couple of times. Mazzone is kind of known for being a tough guard and Dominick did a great job on him.”
Christian Carson-Bannister wasn’t tested often, but when he was, he came up with the saves. He made six saves, including five of them in the first half, to help limit the Friars.
Of concern for the Terriers might be Ryan Hilburn, who went down with what appeared to be an injury in the third quarter and it led to a Terrier extra man opportunity. Ryan Johnston, getting his first action of the game, buried the ball past freshman goalie Tate Boyce to extend the BU lead.
It wasn’t the same old cast of characters scoring for the Terriers. Wilson got his two goals, both heavy shots underneath the crossbar. However, Hayden Ruiz also got on the board after Polley mentioned earlier in the week he may be a player to watch this season. Hilburn scored early in the game as well. Cal Dearth was held to just an assist, and he and freshman midfielder Brendan Homire facilitated the offense from the top of the settled formation.
Burr saw some time playing behind the net, a position the Terriers rotated often in the game. Wilson, more accustomed to the position, saw time there and freshman Tristan Ruh also saw extra man time playing at the X. Pat Myers took over the position for most of the second half.
The Terriers will return to action next Saturday when they host the UMass Lowell Riverhawks at Nickerson Field at 1 p.m. BU will try to go 2-0 in the non conference slate of games early in this season.