ANNAPOLIS, Md. – Up and down the field, scoring in bunches – Saturday's Colgate-Navy men's lacrosse matchup had it all for those tuning in via the Patriot League Network.
The only thing missing was a Raiders victory, as underdog Colgate wound up on the short end of a 16-14 outcome and dropped its sixth in a row.
Griffin Brown scored four goals, upping his collegiate total to 98.
Mike Hawkins added his own hat trick and two assists.
Nicky Petkevich matched his collegiate high with four assists. And
Malcolm Feeney won a career-high 23 faceoffs in 34 tries.
Yet it wasn't quite enough as Navy was able to match and just exceed the Raiders in the goal department. Especially during a crazy second quarter.
That period saw 14 goals scored – 8 for Navy, 6 for Colgate – leading to three ties and three lead changes. The Raiders scored twice in the opening 38 seconds to lead 5-2, then fell behind 7-6, then reclaimed an 8-7 lead, only for Navy to grab a 10-9 advantage at halftime.
Colgate in the second half never could draw level despite pulling within a single goal at 11-10, 12-11 and again at 15-14 on a
Brian Minicus tally with 3:52 remaining. But Navy went on the extra-man and Patrick Skainiak scored with 1:32 showing to put it away.
Navy's three man-up goals in three tries proved to be the difference. Tyler Perreten was the top Navy scorer with five goals and two assists. The Mids improved to 3-2 overall and 1-1 in the Patriot League.
The Raiders were a perfect 15-of-15 on clears and committed a season-low 11 turnovers. And Colgate peppered the shots at Navy to the tune of a season-high 57. Seventeen of those came in the fourth quarter and resulted in three goals, but Navy's Ryan Kern made five saves in the period and 15 for the game to keep the Raiders just short.
Colgate's
Sean Nelson caused three turnovers and scooped up three ground balls – both career highs.
Ryan Decker added a career-high five ground balls to match Feeney's total. And Petkevich in additional to his assists also scored with 3.2 seconds left in the first quarter for a 3-2 Raiders lead.
The Raiders pushed that lead to 5-2 before Navy turned it around and led 10-9 at halftime.
Bottom Line
• Navy 16, Colgate 14
From the Source
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Colgate head coach Matt Karweck: (On the result) "We're the underdogs; we have an underdog mentality right now. We're 0-2 in the league, we haven't had any success on the field as far as the scoreboard goes, but we have an unbelievable amount of growth and development from our team.
"Our job right now is to scratch, claw and fight for every inch, and that's what we're going for. That's exactly what we want to do. That's the perseverance I love seeing – a relentless fight to continue developing and growing, and to know that the work we do on Mondays through Fridays is going to put us in position to hopefully have success on Saturdays. We're going to fight."
(On the game) "We did a bunch of really good things. We were perfect in the clearing game, we took over 50 shots, we were generating what we wanted to in multiple phases of the game, we scored on man-up, we scored in transition and we scored in six-on-six. We had a lot of opportunities to put the ball in the back of the net. We've got to capitalized on those, for sure.
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"We dominated at the faceoff-X – our poles and our wing play was phenomenal. We're still in the penalty box too often but I'll tell you what, I loved our guys' fight and energy. That first quarter was the best defense we've played all year long. I was really proud of our defense. They got to the middle of the field on us a few too many times, and they did a really good job shooting the ball against us. They only had 43 shots and they put 16 in – that's a healthy day of shooting for them.
"But I'm really proud of the way our guys are working and fighting, and that's what I told them in the locker room. We're the underdogs in every single game and we need to fight for every inch. We're the underdogs, and that's a really dangerous place for other teams to have to face us. We've got six more contests in the Patriot League in order to make the tournament. Our goal is to make that tournament.
"We've got to grow, we've got to build, we've got to develop. We're learning from losing, and that stinks. But if it gets us the most development that we could possible get, I'll take that any day of the week. I don't want to lose – let's be very clear. But if we are going to learn and develop from what is happening today, about how to win and how to be more poised in some of these moments and continue to trust our approaches, then we're going to do that."
Stats of the Game
• Two more goals for Brown and the Virginia senior becomes the ninth Raider in history to top the century mark.
• Colgate's 14 goals matched the most allowed by Navy this season.
• The 11 Raiders turnovers were a season low.
• Feeney lost four of the six faceoffs in the first quarter and then won 21 of the last 28 over the last three.
Gate Grab Bag
• Attendance inside Navy-Marine Corps Memorial Stadium was 734.
Up Next
• Colgate is home next Saturday to take on Lafayette.
• The Leopards are 0-6 overall and 0-2 in the Patriot League after Saturday's 16-8 home loss to Army.
• Faceoff is 3:30 p.m. from Crown Field at Andy Kerr Stadium, with the Patriot League Network carrying all the action.
