Men's Lacrosse Rallies Late But Loses 7-6 to Penn State

The Villanova men's lacrosse team played another close game on Saturday night at Villanova Stadium, but the outcome was a familiar one as the Cats lost 7-6 to #16 Penn State. With the loss, Villanova drops to 2-6 overall while maintaining their 1-0 Big East record. For Penn State, the win improves their record to 7-3 overall. The Nittany Lions are 2-0 in the competitive CAA.

This time around, the Wildcats played well late in the game, which they haven't done all season. Unfortunately, the offense was stagnant in the first half as the Cats only registered 3 goals through the first 40 minutes of the contest. Trailing 6-3 at half, Nova cut the gap to one on 2 occasions, but they could not break through and get the game even.

Kevin O'Neil had 2 goals for Villanova and John Kluh notched a goal and 2 assists. Thomas Bloomquist was only 5-16 on faceoffs and Reed Carlson made 9 saves in the net. For PSU, Tom LaCrosse scored 3 goals while Shane Sturgis recorded 3 helpers. In the cage, Austin Kaut had a stellar game with 16 saves. Nova head coach Michael Corrado commented on Kaut's strong play in the net by saying,

"Their goalie had 16 saves and at the end of the day I think he is maybe the best goalie in the country, or if not he is definitely right up at the top. He made some big saves tonight but we had six goals on 37 shots and that isn't good enough. We didn't shoot as well as I would have liked but we fought hard the whole game and the effort was good. It is frustrating because we have been on the short end of too many of these games."

Villanova has a quick turnaround from this one. The Cats take on Big East foe Georgetown in the nation's capital on Wednesday evening. Game time is 5 PM and the contest will be televised live on ESPNU.