Colgate Defeats No. 3 Army in Latest Patriot League Upset

No conference does chaos like the Patriot League.

Unranked Colgate staked its claim in the wide-open race Saturday, defeating third-ranked Army 14-11 in West Point.

The Raiders, who lost last week at Navy, now boast two wins over teams ranked in the top five of this week’s USA Lacrosse Division I Men’s Top 20. They stunned Penn State in the season opener two months ago.

Much has changed since then, including Army’s ascent with a 7-0 start. But in the Patriot League, it’s much the same — it’s anyone’s game.

Boston University was the first team to knock off Army, Navy dealt BU and Colgate their lone conference defeats, Lehigh edged Navy and now Loyola has won three straight games. It’s madness. Beautiful madness.

Colgate injected tempo and sloppy play into Saturday’s game with a 10-man ride. The teams combined for 54 turnovers. Army had more shots (47-31) and ground balls (40-27), won more faceoffs (Will Coletti 22-for-28), committed fewer turnovers (24 to Colgate’s 30) and had fewer penalties yet lost largely because the Raiders capitalized more in unsettled situations.

That, and goalie Matt LaCombe was marvelous. He made 18 saves, including seven in the fourth quarter as the Black Knights attempted to come back from a six-goal deficit.

Colgate’s six-goal run to end the third quarter proved to be the difference. It came with flair, as Liam O’Connor sent a behind-the-back pass through traffic from goal line extended to his brother Rory O’Connor, who cut to the crease, caught the ball and scored to make it 14-8. That came just minutes after Jacob Sposita scored a behind-the-back goal as his momentum carried him away from the goal about eight yards out.

Army scored three goals in the fourth quarter, including a pair of man-up tallies inside of five minutes remaining to pull within three. That’s as close as it would get.

Hunter Drouin led the Raiders (7-4, 4-1) with four goals and two assists. Aidan Murnane caused three turnovers and scooped three ground balls.

The Black Knights (8-2, 3-2) struggled to muster much offense beyond Jackson Eicher (four goals, three assists) and Gunnar Fellows (three goals, one assist). They host Navy next Saturday.

DEFENSE WINS THE DAY

There were several standout defensive performances Saturday:

• No. 2 Virginia smothered No. 20 North Carolina in its ACC opener, forcing the Tar Heels to shoot just 6-for-36 and commit 23 turnovers in a 14-6 Cavaliers victory. Payton Cormier became just the fifth player in NCAA Division I history to reach 200 career goals and is within striking distance of Mac O’Keefe’s national record (221). But it really was all about the D, including four caused turnovers by short stick Chase Yager and three by close defenseman Cole Kastner.
• No. 10 Yale held an opponent to single digits for the first time this season, defeating No. 12 Penn 12-9.  Quakers goalie Emmet Carroll keeps piling up big performances. He made 16 saves but Penn did itself in with 11 second-half turnovers.
• No. 8 Maryland needed offense from its defense, too. A pair of pole goals helped propel the Terps to an 8-7 win over Ohio State. Eric Spanos scored his fourth goal with 5:17 remaining to put Maryland ahead for good. The Terps broke a halftime tie  with a three-goal spurt that included tallies by long sticks Jack McDonald and Nick Altivi.
• No. 6 Johns Hopkins finally won a nail-biter. The Blue Jays — whose three losses have all come in one-goal games, including two overtime defeats — got the better of No. 5 Penn State this time. After a defensive stop in overtime, Dylan Bauer found Matt Collison naked five feet in front of the goal. Collison caught the pass, turned and scored to lift Hopkins to a 9-8 victory at Homewood Field. The game featured great defense on both ends, the Nittany Lions’ buoyed by the return of Jack Posey and Kevin Parnum to the lineup. But the Blue Jays’ back line of Quintan Kilrain (three caused turnovers), Scott V. Smith (two caused turnovers) and Beaudan Szuluk (three caused turnovers) was exceptional. As were both goalies. Hopkins’ Chayse Ierlan and Penn State’s Jack Fracyon each made 16 saves.
• No. 7 Georgetown blanked Marquette in the third quarter and rode its defense to an 11-8 win. Outstanding by Will Foster (five goals) and Luke Williams (19-for-22)  were not enough for the Golden Eagles to keep the five-time defending Big East champions from winning their eighth straight game. Hoyas goalie Anderson Moore tied his career high with 14 saves and Georgetown held Marquette scoreless for spans of 19:01, 17:03 and 11:26.

NOTABLE

• The America East also is a beautiful mess. Binghamton beat Vermont for the first time since 2014, as Gage Adams scored in overtime to lift the Bearcats to an 11-10 victory. Albany, which hosts Bryant on Saturday night, is the only team in the conference without a league loss.
• No. 19 Towson and Delaware look like the clear CAA frontrunners. Both remained undefeated in conference play. The Tigers used a 10-goal run to defeat Hofstra 14-11. The Blue Hens handled Fairfield 14-6.
• Saint Joseph’s just keeps winning. The Hawks made it seven in a row with a convincing 12-7 win over UMass. St. Joe’s has won 22 straight regular-season conference games.
• Trailing by five early in the third quarter, Loyola outscored Bucknell 9-2 the rest of the way for a 15-13 comeback victory. The Greyhounds survived a nine-goal Bison run spanning the first and second quarters.
• Four days after an epic double-overtime comeback win over Syracuse, Cornell shook off a first-half hangover, scoring nine unanswered goals spanning the third and fourth quarters in a 14-8 win over visiting Brown.