Ryan Colsey ripped a left-handed bomb to give Virginia a 9-8 fourth-quarter lead on Notre Dame, much to the delight of 6,497 fans at Klöckner Stadium – the largest home crowd at Virginia in more than a decade.
It was a moment, but not one too big for a Notre Dame team with plenty of championship mettle.
A year ago, Notre Dame rallied past Virginia in the NCAA semifinals on the way to its first national championship. On Saturday, Notre Dame turned to its newcomers down the stretch in an 11-9 victory to wrapped up a 4-0 record in ACC play.
Brown grad transfer Devon McLane tied the game 9-9 for Notre Dame with 10:40 to play and a little over a minute later freshman Jordan Faison gave the Irish the lead for good.
McLane, who finished with three goals, added an insurance goal with 3:40 left.
Irish star Pat Kavanagh also made his presence felt in a game in which he became Notre Dame’s all-time leading scorer.
Back-to-back goals by Payton Cormier gave Virginia a 7-4 lead early in the third quarter, but Notre Dame scored the game’s next four goals. Kavanagh scored the first goal of the run and assisted on two others. He finished the game with four points (2g, 2a), giving him 274 to pass the mark of 274 set by Randy Colley in the mid 1990s.
Notre Dame has won eight straight games and will carry a 10-1 record into the ACC tournament in Charlotte where it will meet a familiar opponent – Virginia.
The Cavaliers have now lost three straight games – to Duke, Syracuse and Notre Dame – but edged out North Carolina for the final spot in the ACC tournament.
Cormier led the Cavaliers with four goals.
UNC Upsets Rival Duke, Misses ACC Tourney
A frustrating season for North Carolina ended on a high note, a 15-12 upset over rival Duke, but it wasn’t enough to get the Tar Heels into the ACC tournament.
Duke, North Carolina and Virginia finished in a three-way tie for third place in the league at 1-3 and the tie-breaker came down to goal differential in the games between the three schools – capped at five. Duke had a plus-2 goal differential, Virginia finished at zero and North Carolina was minus-2.
North Carolina went on a crazy run with three goals in the final 20 seconds of the first half to take a 9-4 halftime lead and led by as many as nine goals in the fourth quarter, but Duke scored the final six goals of the game to get close and end up securing the No. 3 seed.
Logan McGovern had three goals and four assists for North Carolina (7-7), Dominic Pietramala scored four goals, Collin Krieg made 15 saves and Brady Wambach won 16 of 24 faceoffs.
Aidan Danenza led Duke with three goals and an assist.
Princeton Upsets Yale, Cornell Takes No. 1 Seed in Ivy
Princeton’s Michael Gianforcaro, the USA Lacrosse Player of the Week this past week, made 16 saves and held Yale to a season-low eight goals in a 15-8 Tiger victory that clinched an Ivy League tournament berth for Princeton.
Cornell wrapped up the No. 1 seed for the Ivy League tournament thanks to the Yale loss and then wrapped up the outright Ivy League regular season title with a 15-10 win over Dartmouth.
Ginaforcaro had plenty of help in shutting down Yale’s potent offense. Andrew McMeekin won 20 of 26 faceoffs to help Princeton control possession and Coulter Mackesy scored five goals to get the offense going.
Yale’s Matt Brandau, the nation’s leading scorer, was held to three points (2g, 1a), matching his season-low total. He has 97 points in 14 games this season.
Princeton and Yale will meet again in the Ivy League semifinals at Cornell.
Cornell got seven points from star C.J. Kirst (4g, 3a) and goalie Wyatt Knust continued his second half of the season emergence with 18 saves. Dartmouth goalie Mason Morel made 20 saves against a Cornell offense playing without 60-point scorer Michael Long.
Cornell will host Penn in the Ivy semifinals.
