High Point Men’s Lacrosse Rallies Past Sacred Heart, 12-10

FAIRFIELD, Conn. – Sophomore Dan Lomas scored the game-winning goal with a minute left in the game and redshirt-senior Bucky Smith added an insurance goal to lead the High Point University men’s lacrosse team to a 12-10 win at Sacred Heart on Saturday.

“That was a very good battle between two very hungry teams today,” said head coach Jon Torpey. “I have to give a lot of credit to our guys and our staff for staying poised when we came into the fourth quarter down 8-5. We had some guys really step up and make big plays down the stretch and I am really proud of this group’s resilience.”

The Panthers scored the final three goals of the game to rally past Sacred Heart. Mitchell Dupere scored to tie the game 10-10 with just over two minutes left in the game. Dupere picked up a ground ball off a Lomas shot and fired in to tie the game. Lomas collected a pass from sophomore Matt Thistle and scored the game-winning goal with 1:04 to play.

Sacred Heart won the ensuing face-off but turned the ball over, allowing Smith to score with nine seconds remaining and secure the 12-10 win.

Lomas finished with two goals and two ground balls. Smith scored a hat trick for the second straight game and Thistle had two goals and two assists. Redshirt-junior Austin Geisler made 18 saves in the win. He also had four ground balls and one caused turnover.

High Point improves to 2-2 on the season while Sacred Heart drops to 0-2.

High Point stormed out to a 3-0 lead to open the game. Lomas got the scoring started with goal just over two minutes in to the contest. He collected a pass from Thistle to score the game’s first goal. Just over two minutes later (11:24) Bucky Smith fired a shot in from the right alley to put High Point ahead 2-0. Brendan Montrello fed a pass to Michael LeClair for HPU’s third goal with 8:05 to go in the first quarter.

Sacred Heart got on the board with 3:15 on the clock in the first quarter with a man-up goal by Alex Miller after a slashing penalty was called on Zack Price. Smith scored his second goal of the period, again unassisted, to push High Point’s lead to 4-1 at the end of the first.

The Pioneers again capitalized on an extra-man opportunity with a goal by Brian Masi with 7:34 to go in the second quarter. It was the first of three straight goals for Sacred Heart in the period. Masi scored again with 2:55 to go to tie the game 4-4.

Thistle gave High Point a 5-4 lead at the end of the first half with a man-up goal at 2:14 after SHU’s Ryan O’Donoghue was called for a slash.

Sacred Heart scored four-straight goals and held High Point scoreless in the third quarter to take a 8-5 lead in the game. Masi tied the game with his third goal of the day and the Pioneers maintained possession for nearly the entire quarter, stretching he lead to 8-5.

Christian Beith halted the SHU run with a goal 20 seconds in to the fourth quarter. Brad James added two quick goals and Thistle scored his second of the game to cap a four-goal run for HPU that gave the Panthers a 9-8 lead. Sacred Heart took the lead back, 10-9, on back-to-back goals. With 2:05 left in the game Dupere tied the score, 10-10, and set off High Point’s come back.

James (two goals) and LeClair (one goal and one assist) both finished with multi-point games. With two goals Lomas has now tallied a point in 14 straight games going back to last season.

Chris Davila went 8-of-18 at the face-off X with seven ground balls. Pat Farrell had two caused turnovers and Nick Bittner picked up three ground balls.

High Point returns to Vert Stadium on March 1 to face Jacksonville at noon. It is the first Atlantic Sun game for the Panthers.