RICHMOND, Va. – The High Point University men’s lacrosse team scored seven unanswered goals in the fourth quarter to rally past Richmond, 11-7, on Saturday. The Panthers improved to 4-1 in Atlantic Sun play.
“Give credit to Richmond,” said head coach Jon Torpey. “They are a really well coached team that showed a lot of poise and effort today. Our team has been resilient all year and that showed once again today. We did a great job at the face-off X and cleared the ball well. I am proud of the players and staff for pulling out the win today.”
Sophomore Jamie Piluso went 20-of-22 at the face-off X, including a perfect 12-of-12 in the second half to lead the HPU comeback. Piluso also scored one goal and picked up a career-high 12 ground balls. Sophomore Brad James led HPU with four point on two goals and two assists. Sophomore Dan Lomas and freshman Michael LeClair each added a hat trick. Redshirt-junior Austin Geisler made 11 saves, with eight in the second half.
With the win High Point improved to 8-4 overall and 4-1 in the Atlantic Sun. The Panthers are tied with Mercer for the league lead. Richmond dropped to 3-9 overall and 1-2 in league play.
High Point scored the final eight goals of the game to go from trailing, 7-3 to the 11-7 win. Tyler Cook started the run with an unassisted goal with 2:28 remaining in the third quarter to cut Richmond’s lead to 7-4. Harris Levine scored his first career goal to tie the game 7-7 with 10:52 to play. He picked up a ground ball on a caused turnover by Pat Farrell and went down for the score. LeClair notched the game-winning goal with 6:47 remaining and the Panthers went on to the 11-7 win.
The Panthers took an early 2-1 lead in the first quarter. James scored the first goal and assisted the second with a score by LeClair with 5:26 on the clock. With 1:03 to play in the first RU tied the game 2-2 with a goal from Mitch Goldberg. That sparked a five-goal run for the Spiders and High Point trailed 6-2 at halftime.
Lomas scored to start the third period and make it a 6-3 Richmond lead. Lomas has now scored in 13 straight games and tallied a point in 22 straight games. Richmond’s biggest lead was 7-3, on a goal by Jean-Luc Chetner at 8:43 in the third quarter. It was the final RU goal of the game.
Farrell and Zack Price each had two caused turnovers. Lomas, Levine and Adam Seal each picked up three ground balls.
High Point outshot Richmond 40-34 and held the advantage on ground balls 35-28. HPU was 21-of-22 on clear attempts.
High Point wraps up the regular season with two non-conference home games. North Carolina comes to Vert Stadium for a 7 p.m. game on Friday, April 18.