No. 4 Men's Lacrosse beats Cortland, 20-14

ROCHESTER, NY – RIT junior Clifford Gaston tied his career-high tallying eight points to lead No. 4 RIT to a 20-14 win over Cortland, Wednesday.
 
Gaston tallied six goals and two assists, while junior Ethan Harkins tallied a career-high four goals and senior Dylan Bruno tied his career-high with four goals. Graduate student Luke Pilcher tallied three goals and three assists, while graduate student Jake Erickson finished with three goals and two assists.
 
HOW IT HAPPENED:

• Bruno scored 4:57 into the first quarter to give RIT the lead.
• Cortland scored two straight goals taking a 2-1 lead on Tucker Macknik's goal with 5:17 remaining in the quarter.
• Gaston scored two goals in a four-goal RIT run late in the opening quarter, while Pilcher's goal with 2:45 to play gave the Tigers a 5-2 lead.
• Ryan Scanlon scored late in the quarter to cut the RIT lead to 5-3.
• Gaston scored early in the second quarter to give RIT a 6-3 lead, but Caden Yancey answered for the Red Dragons, cutting the Tiger's lead to 6-4 on his goal with 12:24 remaining.
• RIT scored three straight goals, taking a 9-5 lead on Erickson's second goal of the game with 11:15 to pay in the half.
• Klay Stuver cut RIT's lead to 9-5 on his goal with 6:49 remaining, but the Tiger's scored two straight goals, taking an 11-5 lead on Harkins' goal with seven seconds to play in the half.
• Cortland scored the first six goals of the third quarter, tying the score at 11-11 on Scanlon's goal with 6:39 remaining in the quarter.
• RIT answered with a three-goal run, taking a 14-11 lead on Gaston's goal with 1:55 to play.
• Pilcher scored late in the quarter to give RIT a 15-12 lead.
• Harkins scored back-to-back man-up goals early in the fourth quarter to give RIT a 17-12 lead.
• Scanlon scored a man-up goal to cut RIT's lead to 17-13, but Pilcher and Erickson scored back-to-back goals to increase the Tiger's lead to 19-13.
• Stuver scored with 4:38 remaining and Gaston scored his sixth of the game with 1:59 to play to make it a 20-14 final.

 
GAME NOTES:

• RIT outshot Cortland, 52-48.
• Seniors Michael Grace, Hunter FitzGibbons each caused two turnovers.
• Senior Kyle Burbank played the first half, making six saves. Senior Kyle Gaffey played the second half, finishing with six stops.
• Graduate student face-off specialist Allyn French went 15-of-26 on draws and led RIT with 10 ground balls.
• RIT was 14-of-17 on clears and went 4-for-4 on man-up.

 
WHAT'S NEXT
RIT returns to action on Saturday (March 30) against Vassar at 12:00 p.m.