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May Madness arrived early.

Saturday brought out the best of college lacrosse, with hair-raising highlights and nail-biting finishes on the penultimate weekend of the regular season.

Five of 11 games featuring teams ranked inside the Nike/US Lacrosse Division I Men’s Top 20 —not including the nightcap between No. 20 Johns Hopkins and No. 3 Maryland — were decided in the final moments of regulation or overtime.

Kelly Clinches, Ament Climbs

Jack Kelly handled a Grant Ament skip feed to the interior and deposited it with 40 seconds left to lift No. 1 Penn State to a 14-13 victory over upset-minded Rutgers, as the Nittany Lions completed a perfect run through the Big Ten in dramatic fashion.

Ament’s assist was his seventh of the game and 71st of the season, a Penn State and Big Ten record. With the Big Ten and NCAA tournaments ahead of the Nittany Lions (12-1, 5-0 Big Ten), it’s likely Ament will surpass the NCAA Division I record of 77 currently shared by Steve Marohl (UMBC) and Lyle Thompson (Albany).

Tommy Coyne scored a game-high six goals for Rutgers (7-7, 2-3), which will get another crack at Penn State next week in the Big Ten semifinals.

Virginia, Notre Dame to Meet for ACC Title

Seventh-ranked Virginia, the top seed in the ACC tournament, erased a four-goal deficit in the fourth quarter and defeated North Carolina 14-13 in the first of two ACC semifinals Saturday in Chapel Hill, N.C  Ian Laviano’s fourth goal with 1:30 remaining completed the comeback and proved to be the game-winner.

Matt Moore doled out six assists, including a lob at the goal that Mikey Herring slammed home like an alley-oop dunk to close a four-goal run to tie the game at 12.

The Cavaliers (12-3) will host Notre Dame in the ACC championship game next Saturday. The 11th-ranked Fighting Irish (8-5) defeated fourth-ranked Duke 12-10 in the other semifinal, riding a five-goal performance by reigning ACC tournament MVP Bryan Costabile and 18 saves from goalie Matt Schmidt.

The Tar Heels (8-7), who staged a dramatic rally to stun Syracuse in the quarterfinals Thursday, will await Selection Sunday with long odds. They entered the week ranked 20th in RPI.

The Blue Devils (11-4) remain a safe bet to host an NCAA tournament first-round game.

PHOTO BY RICH BARNES

Cornell’s Jeff Teat (3) and Clarke Petterson (4) celebrate after connecting for Petterson’s game-winning goal with four seconds remaining in a 14-13 win over Princeton in Ithaca, N.Y..

Cornell Edges Princeton

Cornell’s Jeff Teat and Clarke Petterson, one of the most dynamic and entertaining attack duos in college lacrosse, connected when it counted most Saturday.

Teat fed Petterson with a precision pass in stride, and Petterson redirected the ball over Princeton goalie Erik Peters’ right shoulder with just four seconds remaining to lift the ninth-ranked Big Red to a 14-13 win over rival Princeton.

Cornell (10-4, 4-2 Ivy League) secured the No. 3 seed in the upcoming Ivy League tournament. Petterson finished with seven points on four goals and three assists. John Piatelli added four and two, respectively, as the Big Red attack accounted for 16 points.

The Tigers (7-7, 2-4) saw their season come to an end despite another extraordinary effort by Michael Sowers, who scored seven goals and added an assist, surpassing Kevin Lowe as Princeton’s all-time leading scorer with 255 career points and again breaking his own school single-season record with 90 points. Sowers, a junior, now holds the top three scoring seasons in Tigers history with 90, 83 and 82 points the last three years, respectively.

Wild Finish as Providence Defeats Villanova

No. 17 Villanova is the fourth seed in the Big East tournament, but the Wildcats are backing into the postseason after floundering in the final minutes of a 9-8 overtime loss to Providence.

The Wildcats (8-6, 3-2 Big East) led 8-7 and caused a turnover in their defensive end to gain possession with 12 seconds remaining in regulation. But Friars goalie Tate Boyce stripped Patrick Kennedy of possession with four seconds left and sent the ball back into the offensive end into the stick of Nick Hatzipetrakos, who scored the buzzer-beater to send the game into overtime.

It took Providence (7-8, 3-2) all of five seconds to complete the stunning comeback. Colin Keating won the opening faceoff of overtime and took it to the house for his only goal of the season.

The Friars are the third seed in the Big East tournament and will play Georgetown in the semifinals at Denver. Villanova plays the top-seeded Pioneers.

High Point Secures Top Seed in SoCon

Asher Nolting held out for a one-on-one on the wing, got topside, beat his defender on a rocker step and scored with six seconds remaining to lift 15th-ranked High Point to a 15-14 win over Richmond and the top seed in the upcoming Southern Conference tournament.

Nolting finished with four goals and three assists, while Davis Sampere set program records with 22 faceoff wins and 18 ground balls.

NEC Field Set

Two additional one-goal results finalized the field for the Northeast Conference tournament.

Mount St. Mary’s clinched the top seed with a 7-6 win over Saint Joseph’s. The Mountaineers will play red-hot Robert Morris, which defeated Hobart 16-15 in overtime for its sixth straight victory, in the NEC semifinals.

Hobart and Sacred Heart will meet in the other semifinals.

In other results Saturday:

  • Trevor Patschorke scored a career-high five goals to lead UMBC to an 11-9 win at Hartford, as the Retrievers secured the No. 4 seed in the America East tournament.

  • Towson won without the services of All-American faceoff specialist Alex Woodall, who left last week’s game against Delaware with an apparent head injury and sat out Saturday against Drexel. The Tigers used a late fourth-quarter surge to defeat the Dragons 11-9.

  • Tewaaraton nominees TD Ierlan and Jackson Morrill showed why they’re considered among the best players in college lacrosse Saturday. Ierlan won all 26 of his faceoff attempts, scooped 20 ground balls and added two points, while Morrill tallied a career-high 10 points on eight goals and two assists in a 22-11 win over Harvard. The Bulldogs (11-2, 5-1 Ivy League) enter the conference tournament on a five-game winning streak. They’ll play Cornell in the semifinals next weekend in New York, while Penn and Brown will meet in the other half of the bracket.

Nike/US Lacrosse
Division I Men’s
Top 20 Scoreboard

No. 1 Penn State 14, Rutgers 13
No. 2 Yale 22, Harvard 11
No. 20 Johns Hopkins at No. 3 Maryland – 7:30 p.m.
No. 11 Notre Dame 12, No. 4 Duke 10 *
No. 5 Penn 12, Vermont 10
No. 7 Virginia 14, North Carolina 13 *
No. 9 Cornell 14, Princeton 13
No. 14 Towson 11, Drexel 9
No. 15 High Point 15, Richmond 14
Providence 9, No. 17 Villanova 8 (OT)
No. 18 Georgetown 14, St. John’s 10

* ACC semifinals

Other Scores

Air Force 13, Bellarmine 6
Brown 11, Dartmouth 7
Furman 20, VMI 6
Jacksonville 20, Mercer 12
Monmouth 12, Siena 6
Mount St. Mary’s 7, Saint Joseph’s 6
Quinnipiac 15, Manhattan 9
Robert Morris 16, Hobart 15 (OT)
Sacred Heart 17, Wagner 5
UMBC 11, Hartford 9
Utah 16, Detroit Mercy 10