Army Reaches Semifinals; Alberici Wins No. 100

Tuesday, April 26

West Point, NY

4 PM

Army West Point

9-5

#5 Lehigh

6-9

Lehigh

Army West Point

Army Reaches Semifinals; Alberici Wins No. 100

April 26, 2016 | Men's Lacrosse

Box Score

WEST POINT, N.Y. – The fourth-seeded Army West Point men's lacrosse team went 4-for-6 on man-up situations and cruised to a 13-6 win over Lehigh in the Patriot League Quarterfinals to advance to semifinals on Friday night.

The Black Knights (9-5) got head coach Joe Alberici his 100th career victory as a college lacrosse head coach. He is 100-81 overall in his career.

Army had nine different goal scorers in the game. Connor Cook, Nate Jones, Jimbo Moore and Luke Poulos had two goals apiece in the win. Cook and Jones each added assists for three-point game, while Cole Johnson tallied five points on a goal and four assists.

Dan Grabher was incredible at the faceoff, winning 12o-f-13 draws with nine ground balls, while Alex Daly finished with five wins in eight chances. Overall, Army was 18-for-22 in faceoffs.

AJ Barretto stopped 10 shots in the win for his eighth victory of the season. Matt Isnardi came in late in the game and had one save.

Lehigh (6-9) was led by Reid Weber and Andrew Pettit with two goals apiece. Chris Kiernan earned the start in net and made 11 saves.

The two teams struggled to get into the game as it was scoreless for over the first 10 minutes of the game. The scoring picked up in the final 4:37 of the opening frame. Lehigh got on the board first and then Army followed up with four-straight including the first two from Jones and Grabher in a span of 19 seconds. The Black Knights finished with five goals in the first quarter and had a 5-2 lead.

Poulos and Moore each scored their second goals of the game in the second quarter to help the Black Knights take a 8-4 lead into the break. Shea Mullins also potted his third of the season in the second quarter. Pettit led the way for the Mountain Hawks in the first half with two goals, while Cody Triolo had two helpers.

Both netminders came out on fire and combined for 12 saves in the first 30 minutes with Barretto stopping five and Kiernan pushing aside seven.

The two teams had two goals each in the third quarter and Army took a 10-6 lead into the final period. Cook scored a man-up goal 16 seconds into the second half and then Weber answered with two-straight to cut the lead to 9-6. That was as close as Lehigh got the rest of the way as Conor Glancy stopped the short run with his seventh of the year to close out the third frame.

Army dominated the final quarter and score twice on the man-up to put the game out of reach. Ted Glesener scored his league-leading sixth man-up goal with 12:42 remaining and then Jones fired home his 35th goal of the year and tied Glesener for the league lead in man-up goals with six. Cook finished the scoring with 2:09 left to give Army the 13-6 victory.

Army led in the shot battle by a 35-24 margin and had 36 ground balls to Lehigh's 21.

The Black Knights are back in action on Friday night in the Patriot League Semifinals against top-seeded Navy at 4:30 p.m.

Game Notes: This was the first postseason victory against Lehigh for the Black Knights in three tries … The Black Knights are 23-7 against the Mountian Hawks all-time … Army had a season-high four man-up goals and have tallied a total of 23 goals with the extra man … Poulos tied a career high with two goals … Johnson is tied with Jeremy Boltus '13 for fifth on Army's all-time single season scoring list with 67 points this year after five today … the Black Knights improve their Patriot League postseason record to 7-10 ... Grabher won a season high 12 faceoffs and picked up a team high nine ground balls, which was the most all season for a single player in a single game ... Army becomes the only Patriot League school to play in all 12 Patriot League Semifinals and the only team to make the semifinals each year since the league expanded to add Loyola and Boston University.