Offense Sputters As Marquette Men’s Lacrosse Falls To Robert Morris

At a glance, you could look at Marquette Golden Eagles men’s lacrosse’s 10-7 loss to Robert Morris on Saturday and say “ah, well, 10-7, low scoring, just didn’t go their way.” That’s fair, I suppose.

Instead, though, what I saw was an offensive performance that was some part unable to unlock the RMU defense and some part unable to keep track of the ball. The Golden Eagles committed 22 turnovers in the game, eight more than the Colonials, and had five failed clearances on the afternoon, four in the second quarter alone. MU trailed RMU in shots on the day, 35-32, but just 18 of the Golden Eagles’ 32 shots found their way on frame through the course of 60 minutes.

Heck, Robert Morris’ first two goals of the game came because the Golden Eagles’ defense got caught in a bad position because of what happened on the other end of the field. Maybe there’s not much you can do when the goalie makes a save, but the Colonials broke free out of their defensive end and scored just 15 seconds after that save to tie the game at one each. Goal #2 for RMU came three minutes later and just nine seconds after a Chris Kirschner turnover as the home team bolted down the field to make the play.

Still, Marquette’s biggest problem of the day happened in the third quarter. It was 5-4 Robert Morris at halftime thanks to a Kirschner man-up goal with 70 seconds left before the break. RMU then held Marquette without a goal until the 6:13 mark of the third quarter, a nearly 10 minute long drought for the Golden Eagles. Logan Kreinz was the goal scorer there, and he made it a 7-5 ball game...... and then MU didn’t score again until over a minute into the fourth quarter. One goal for Marquette in a 17-plus minute stretch..... and the Colonials scored four times along the way. 9-5 heading to the fourth quarter, and even though Marquette scored twice in the first 5:30, they couldn’t do much more about the differential the rest of the way. A holding penalty on Mason Woodward didn’t really help, and the three turnovers in the final seven minutes weren’t a fun time, either.

Freshman Will Foster had the best point total of the day, getting to three on a goal and two assists. Jake Stegman had two goals to lead the Golden Eagles in that column. Marquette’s close defense trio — Woodward, Noah Verlinde, and David Lamarca — all tied for the team lead in ground balls, but I’m pretty sure that the RMU game staff weren’t properly scoring face-offs. All game long, the live stats looked an awful lot like they were using the women’s lacrosse data set, and thus 13 face-off wins by Luke Williams turned into just one ground ball for him, and that seems wrong. Goalie Michael Allieri had a decent day, making 10 stops on 20 shots on goal. Just would have been nice if the offense could have picked him up a bit on the other end.

Up Next: Marquette takes their 2-5 record to next weekend for one final non-conference bout before Big East play starts. Next Saturday, they’ll be back at home and they’ll be hosting Air Force with an 11am start on Saturday. The Falcons are 4-4 on the year, but have won four straight games heading into Saturday.