On Saturday, Feb. 14, Villanova men’s lacrosse fell to St. Joseph’s, 11-9, in its home opener.
Graduate attackman/midfielder Luke Raymond scored a game-high four goals. Junior midfielder Nick Lucchesi registered two goals and one assist.
“I thought Luke Raymond obviously played well,” head coach Michael Corrado said. “He had four goals, and the team faced off a little bit better after the first quarter. So I thought that in those two areas, we did a better job. Defensively, they only scored three goals throughout the game after the first quarter. So the defense played better. It’s a long game, right? We got to trail by two at halftime and then again in the fourth quarter. We just couldn’t get that next goal to cut it down to one.”
The ‘Cats (1-1) totaled 43 shots, with 23 of them on goal. In comparison, St. Joseph’s (1-1) took 34 shots, with 21 on goal.
Sophomore goalkeeper Denis Fargione made 10 saves for the Wildcats in the contest, while senior goalkeeper Tommy Gross made 14 saves for St. Joseph’s.
Villanova won nine face-offs, in comparison to the Hawks’ 14.
St. Joseph’s took an early lead, scoring eight of its 11 total goals in the first period.
“I don’t think [St. Joseph’s] did anything special,” Corrado said. “They just executed. We couldn’t win a face off [at the beginning of the first quarter], and that snowballed on us a little bit.”
Five Hawks contributed to the offensive effort, with freshman attackman/midfielder Colby Wood, sophomore attackman Will Barber and junior midfielder Tyler Moore each scoring a pair.
The ‘Cats scored five goals in the second period, cutting the deficit to 8-6 before halftime. Raymond rallied the comeback, finding a hat trick in the first half.
During the opening minutes of the second half, St. Joseph’s scored two third-period goals.
The ‘Cats managed to score three goals in the game’s closing period, but fell short.
Looking towards the Wildcats’ upcoming matches, Corrado wants to improve consistency.
“We got outscored in the first quarter, then we outscored them five to nothing in the second quarter,” Corrado said. “They scored a couple to make it 10-6, and then we made it 10-8. Then it got to 11-8, so I think we need to be a little more consistent.”
Villanova will start a stretch of three away games, beginning with a trip to Piscataway, NJ, to take on No. 18 Rutgers (2-1) on Saturday, Feb. 21, before returning to Villanova Stadium on March 8 to face the University of Pennsylvania (0-1) for the Farrell Cup.
“A lot of times we play better away from home than we actually do at home, so we’ll see how it goes,” Corrado said. “It’s still only February, so the goal at this point is to keep getting better, figuring out lineups and identifying what we’re doing well and what we need to work on.”
This is the team’s first meeting with Rutgers in more than a decade. In their last meeting in 2014, the Wildcats grabbed a 15-11 win over the Scarlet Knights. Face-off is set for 1:00 p.m. and will be streamed on B1G+.
