No. 11 Rutgers men's lacrosse shut down in loss to No. 7 Army
The Rutgers men's lacrosse team was defeated 16-7 by Army on Saturday afternoon. The Scarlet Knights (2-1, 0-0) struggled on both sides of the ball in their tough loss to the Black Knights (2-0, 0-0).
Here are three takeaways from No. 11 Rutgers' defeat.
Defensive struggles
The Knights could not handle No. 7 Army's high-powered offense, as they were outshot 41-29 and conceded a season-high 16 goals.
Rutgers was able to get out to an early 2-0 lead thanks to a pair of goals from senior midfielder Shane Knobloch, but that would ultimately be the only time the Knights led in the contest.
The Black Knights responded with a 3-0 scoring run and then netted 2 more goals to lead 5-3 after the first quarter.
Army would take full control of the game in the second quarter, scoring 4 more goals to lead 9-3 at halftime.
Things would not get any better for Rutgers in the third quarter. The Black Knights continued to fire on all cylinders and led 13-5 after 45 minutes of play.
Head coach Brian Brecht decided to take out redshirt freshman goalkeeper Cardin Stoller and bring in graduate student goalkeeper Seamus Fagan halfway through the third quarter.
"Cardin Stoller's our starter, but I didn't think he was having his best day," Brecht said.
Army finished off the game by scoring 3 more goals in the final quarter and, at one point, had a 16-6 advantage, its largest lead of the afternoon.
Stoller conceded 13 goals and recorded 10 saves, while Fagan let in 3 goals and had 3 saves.
The Knights were only able to cause five turnovers while committing 17 turnovers of their own.
Offense heavily limited
Rutgers has a strong attack, with stalwart players such as Knobloch, graduate student attacker Ross Scott and senior midfielder Jack Aimone. On Saturday, the Black Knights were able to successfully limit the Knights from getting anything going offensively.
After graduate student midfielder Tim Sommer scored approximately halfway through the first quarter, Rutgers would go on a scoring drought that lasted more than 17 minutes of game time.
Knobloch would end the scoring drought with a tally with less than 5 minutes left in the second quarter, but most of the damage had already been done.
Scott, Aimone and junior attacker Dante Kulas were unable to find the back of the net, but freshman midfielder Colin Kurdyla stepped up and had a hat trick in the loss.
"We didn’t shoot well, our specialties man-up, man-down weren't the same as they were in the last two games, our faceoffs weren't the same way as they were in the last few games," Brecht said.
Troubles on the faceoff
Army had a 17-10 advantage over the Knights on the faceoff.
Graduate student faceoff Cole Brams won 10 out of 21 faceoff attempts, while freshman faceoff Brock Desmarais and graduate student faceoff Matt Soutar did not win any of their faceoffs. This allowed the Black Knights to win possession of the ball and create more scoring opportunities.
Rutgers will have another tough contest on Saturday in Baltimore, Maryland when it battles with Loyola Maryland, the No. 20 ranked team in the country. The game will begin at 1 p.m. and will be broadcast on ESPN Plus.
"We lost to the better team," Brecht said. "I don't think we executed, and we didn't play well."
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