Spring Break Ends On A Down Note For Lacrosse

WOMEN'S LACROSSE

Marquette falls to 2-5 on the season after losing 12-9 to USC on Saturday afternoon. Four straight Trojan goals in the first 7:07 of the second half, including two in 25 seconds from Caroline de Lyra, turned the game from a 7-6 Marquette halftime lead to a 10-7 Trojan lead. Hayley Baas broke the USC run at the 21:37 mark, but Marquette couldn't cut into the lead any further. In fact, both teams went without a goal for nearly 13 minutes until USC's Paige Bonomi broke through with her fifth and sixth goals of the game to put the game out of reach for the Golden Eagles.

Baas led MU in the goals department with a hat trick. Claire Costanza (1G, 2A) and Kenzie Brown (2G, 1A) tied Baas for the Marquette lead in point for the contest. Bonomi's six scores were a game high, but de Lyra led the Trojans in points with nine on three goals and six assists, including the helper on five of Bonomi's goals.

Up Next: Marquette returns home and will play Harvard (0-4) tomorrow at 3pm. Tickets are just $2 if you're free in the middle of the afternoon.

MEN'S LACROSSE

Marquette wrapped up their Spring Break trip with a record of 1-2 following a 12-7 loss to Saint Joseph's on Saturday.

Three straight Hawks goals to open the scoring after halftime gave Saint Joseph's the cushion they needed to hold on for a win. Those goals took the game from a one goal SJU lead at the break to an 8-4 lead. MU was able to cut into it when SJU's Ted Hospodar was whistled for a two minute non-releaseable checking penalty. That was about the worst thing the Hawks could have happen to them, because as GoMarquette.com points out, Marquette is #2 in the country in man-up offense. Connor Bernal and Tyler Melnyk scored seven seconds apart to cut the lead to just two goals and move Marquette to 8 for 11 on the season in man-up opportunities. The Hawks outscored MU 4-1 over the last 18 minutes of the game to seal the win.

Going back to that GoMarquette.com recap, it seems that head coach Joe Amplo was less than thrilled with his team's performance in this game. First, this quote from the man with the whistle:

I just don’t think our guys know yet the sense the urgency that they need to play with in order to compete in division I. Everyone is good, everyone is well-coached, and St. Joe’s is a very good team. If you don’t have that desire every second of the game, you’re going to get beat, and I just didn’t feel that from our guys overall throughout the day.

And this one regarding B.J. Grill going 4-9 in faceoffs while the rest of the team went 3-14:

The positive thing is we can win with B.J. Grill. That kid’s a warrior, and we got to find more guys like him that play with his heart and soul, because that kid brought so much to the table today. I don’t want to be negative about the entire day, because I think that we found that B.J. is a winner, and he’s going to be able to help us in a lot of different ways, and hopefully that becomes contagious.

Hopefully most of what he's saying here is largely due to 1) the long road trip and 2) Marquette going through the growing pains of being a first year program. The good news is that Coach Amplo will have nearly two weeks to impress both of these points on his team. Marquette doesn't play again until Friday, March 29th, when they travel to play Georgetown. The Hoyas are currently 3-3 and will play twice more before hosting MU.