Crusaders Comeback Falls Short in Closing Seconds to Hilbert College
IRVING, Texas – The University of Dallas men's lacrosse team produced a six-goal run in the final 10 minutes of Tuesday's game versus Hilbert College. Already having surpassed its season total of goals at the start of the last quarter with seven, Dallas (0-3) rallied back with a trio of goals in two minutes and put another three goals from 4:10 to 2:12 left to nip a 14-7 gap to 14-13.
The Hawks (2-1) withstood three shots down a man in the last 11 seconds to hang onto the narrow win. Goalkeeper Michael Dhondt was the difference maker in those final plays making two saves to finish with 10 and preserved the victory. His save total equaled UD's overall total as well.
Jake Frederick (Coppell, Texas) paced the Crusaders with a game-high six goals. He added an assist to finish with seven points, and notched a personal-best 12 ground balls, and won 14 faceoffs in the team's best performance of the spring.
Down a goal nearly four minutes into action, Frederick scored the equalizer. Hilbert had two more goals from Anthony Cappola and Daniel Flynn, his second at that point of the game, before Frederick landed the Crusaders other goal with 4:15 left.
Cappola was the third individual in the contest at that juncture to boast multiple scores to make it 4-2 less than a minute into the game. James Chadwick dished his second assist overall, with both occurring on the first scoring play of the first two quarters.
UD turned the momentum into its favor with three goals in a row starting with one by Frederick to secure his hat trick and two more from Tucker Jameson (Mechanicsville, Md.) for the 2019 leading scorers first ones of this campaign.
Dallas' 5-4 lead was gained at 9:49 and would be relinquished for a tie by Flynn's goal on the man-up with seven and a half left. Chadwick and Edward Mathias together pushed four goals in with two apiece that closed the first half with Hilbert carried a 9-4 advantage into halftime.
Mathias assisted the first goals of both quarters in the second half. After UD's Frederick traded a goal to maintain a four-goal margin, two more goals for the Hawks separated the teams to as many as six. Mathias put in a man-up goal at 11:03, which was assisted by Chadwick. Chadwick and Mathias were responsible for a quartet of Hilbert's five second half goals. Chadwick put in the visitor's last goal at 11:35 and the rest of the stanza's offense came from UD's side. Jameson put in his third goal for the team's other hat trick in the third.
Bogar Trout III (Tecumseh, Mich.) sparked the run at 9:58 with an assist coming from Austin Gibbons (St. Charles, Ill.). Gibbons, who dished two helpers, scored next and Frederick added consecutive scores at 8:03 and 4:10, respectively. Both had come on hustle plays by UD as Tommy Chadwick (Tampa, Fla.) swiped a ground ball on the faceoff win that led to Fredericks' first goal mentioned. Frederick did it himself in half the timespan remaining for his final and career-high sixth goal of the match. He followed a wide shot by his teammate and fought for a big possession to land the immediate goal that made it 14-11. Chadwick propelled that momentum forward with a ground ball on the faceoff win that set Gibbions up for his first multi-scoring game of the year and got Jameson the assist. Kyle Goodwin (Philadelphia, Pa.) rounded out the scoring with his first collegiate one.
In the remaining two minutes, Dallas started with the next possession by winning the faceoff only to turn the ball over to the Hawks. A turnover gave the ball back to the home squad in the last 1:21 minutes. Travis Kilanowski got called for slashing with 22 seconds to give the Crusaders a man-up opportunity. Dallas was 0-for-2 on penalties, while HC went 2-for-4 on its chances with an extra man. Goodwin had a saved shot in the final 11 ticks on the game clock. Gibbons fired the last two shots with one wide and then had his last second attempt saved up high to prevent the game-tying chance that would have forced overtime.
UD was outshot by 10 (45-35) but claimed a season-most in total attempts. The home squad also was only outshot on cage by one (24-23). Trout added a 3-for-5 in the faceoff circle to give the Crusaders 17 wins in 30 attempts. The Crusaders held a 37-27 edge in ground balls.
The Hawks turned the ball over fewer times with 15 compared to 18 by UD. This included a three-margin differential in caused turnovers of 7-4 favoring Hilbert. 11 of the team's 14 goals were assisted with Chadwick and Mathias having four apiece. The duo notched team-highs in points (eight), while four players registered all the team's goals with hat tricks for all.
Owen Gibbons (St. Charles, Ill.) made his first start with one half of work. Sam Dixon (Hurst, Texas) had the other half and both made five saves for UD.
UP NEXT
Dallas returns to action a week from today against Franciscan University at 4 p.m.