On Friday, April 25, No. 19 Villanova men’s lacrosse (7-5, 4-1 Big East) concluded the regular season with a 17-9 loss to No. 14 Georgetown (9-4, 4-1 Big East) in the nation’s capital, ending their five-game winning streak.
The Wildcats finished the regular season as co-Big East Champions. A sixth consecutive win would have made them outright regular-season champions.
“At the start of the season, we were 2-5,” head coach Mike Corrado said. “I told the guys today that we didn’t lose for six weeks, and our last loss was March 16. The kids played a lot better in the 5-0 stretch, and yesterday was just an off day against a good team.”
The start of the game was fast-paced, with the Hoyas scoring two early goals. Villanova senior attacker Luke Raymond then answered with a goal, trimming the Georgetown lead to 2-1.
With 1:14 left in the first quarter, senior Dan Martin scored a goal, which tied the game, 5-5.
Villanova’s momentum quickly tied after the Hoyas put up a 4-0 run in the second quarter. It stretched Georgetown’s lead to 9-5.
With freshman goalkeeper Denis Fargione struggling to contain the Hoyas, Corrado brought on redshirt sophomore Anthony Wilson to take over in goal.
“We’re confident in Anthony and Denis,” Corrado said. “A lot of the goals Denis missed were pretty high percentage. We were just looking to try to give the team a spark, and [Wilson] came in and did a nice job for us.”
At the start of the season, Wilson was the starting goalkeeper but lost his starting place to Fargione after just three games.
Graduate attacker Matt Licata was able to get the Wildcats a sixth goal, but the Hoyas continued to dominate and went into halftime with an 11-6 lead.
Coming out of halftime, the Hoyas continued to dominate and added three unanswered goals to their lead.
Sophomore attacker Colin Michener, who has led the Wildcats in scoring this season with 23 goals, struggled to score against the Hoyas. Michener’s first goal of the game did not come until the start of the fourth quarter.
“Colin had two assists in the first quarter, so I thought he was an important part of our offense,” Corrado said. “In that second and third quarter, we just didn’t have the ball very much, so it was frustrating. So, I thought he actually did a nice job.”
With 7:36 left in the game, Licata scored his second goal, but the team still trailed by seven and was unable to find the net for the remainder of the game.
“Last year we had a chance to win the championship against Georgetown and lost in overtime,” Corrado said. “This is kind of a similar scenario to last year, so we’re hoping that we can rebound and come out and play a good game on Thursday against Providence.”
The Wildcats will now shift to the Big East tournament. They will enter the tournament as the second seed and will face Providence (7-7, 3-2 Big East) on May 1 in Denver (9:07 p.m. EST, FloSports).
