AMCATS Take the Sting out of Hornets

PAXTON, Mass – After a week and a half away from the field, the Anna Maria men's lacrosse team took on the Lyndon State Hornets Thursday evening on AMCAT field in Paxton. Coming off a close loss to Nichols 12 days earlier, the 'Cats wanted to get back to winning ways. They did just that, beating Lyndon 17-7 to improve to 2-1 on the young season.

Anna Maria got four goals from leading scorer Brandon Pavoni who has now scored 10 goals on the season after a six goal performance in the season opener against Mitchell and a slow no goal night against Nichols two weeks ago. Freshman Jake Klemba continued his scoring ways, adding three to the AMCATS tally to get him to nine goals on the year. Cameron Perry and Andrew Marcotte each netted two goals in the victory. Goalie Paul Schwarz remained dominant in this game, making six saves in three quarters of work with great defense in front of him.

The Hornets had five different scorers in the game including Shea Jones and Konner Bick who had multi-goal games with two apiece. Goalie Marcus Bessette played all 60 minutes, allowing 17 goals on 31 shots and stopped 14.

Anna Maria opened the scoring 36 seconds in to the first quarter when Perry scored his first of the contest, unassisted. Jacob Smith netted another AMCAT goal four minutes later to put the home team up 2-0. With 6:34 remaining in the period, up a man with an AMCAT in the sin bin, Jones cut the lead in half scoring the first of the day for Lyndon. Anna Maria would follow that up with goals from Klemba, Pavoni and Klemba again with eight second remaining to close out the first 15 minutes with a 5-1 advantage of their guests.

The Hornets would add a second man up goal less than a minute in to quarter two with Bick scoring his first of the evening. Anna Maria answered a short time after with a Brady Seymour goal which was assisted by Ryan Rockwal, his second assist on the day. Pavoni scored his second goal with seven and a half minutes left in the half, and James Ceglia scored for Lyndon to close out the scoring in the first half of play with the 'Cats leading 7-3.

Anna Maria dominated the third period on both ends of the field. Schwarz didn't face a shot in the quarter and his offense netted five with Perry, Klemba, Colton Layman, Pavoni, and Malik Griffith scoring to give the home team a comfortable 12-3 advantage heading in to the final quarter of play.

Goalies Gage Garcia and Griffin Moore split the quarter in net for Anna Mari, giving Schwarz a rest after an impressive performance. In the period, Garcia allowed three goals, Moore just one. Lyndon scored the first goal of the period as Bick got his second of the night. Marcotte and Rockwal followed that up with goals of their own to extend the lead back out to nine. The on slot of scoring continued with the Hornets scoring three more times and AMC adding three of their own before all ways said and done. When the clock hit zero the AMCATS and their 10 goal lead propelled them to their second victory of the season.

Anna Maria will be back in action at home on Saturday at 1pm, taking on the Warriors of Eastern Connecticut State.