BETHLEHEM, Pa. --- The Moravian College men's lacrosse team jumped out to a 4-0 first quarter lead and would score seven second half goals as the Greyhounds played their first varsity match since 2010 and earned an 11-6 win over Rosemont College at Rocco Calvo Field Saturday afternoon.
"It feels good to get a win as we restart the program," stated Head Coach Dave Carty. "It was rough at first after we put four straight in because we let them come back and tie it up before fighting back-and-forth then starting to possess the ball and finish some shots. Junior defender Ed Delia was huge by shutting down their number one player Licata, and they really couldn't run much offense after that. Once we listened to the offensive scout by starting to jump picks, they kind of shut down. We finished some shots late, and that is what it takes. You just need to keep fighting. They are a good team and we'll work on fixing the things that didn't work before Wednesday's match."
Senior midfielder Dave Fiumara netted a hat trick and added an assist to lead the Greyhounds while freshman attack James Carroll added two goals and two assists for four points as well. Freshman midfielder Alec Oriolo contributed two goals and an assist while freshman midfielder Dominick Gurreri and freshman midfielder Christopher Klodowski each scored twice for Moravian's other goals.
Freshmen attack Jack Gozzard, midfielder Hayden DuPont and defender John Polich each had one assist, and DuPont won 10-of-16 face-offs and had four ground balls. Polich had a team-high five ground balls while Delia had four ground balls and caused a pair of turnovers. Freshman midfielder Jake Burcaw added three ground balls.
Freshman goalie Kurt Dick made 11 saves for the Greyhounds while junior keeper Michael Smith saw some action in the goal crease as well for Moravian.
The Blue & Grey scored their first two goals just 18 seconds apart a little over four minutes into action, and Fiumara's second goal of the afternoon made the lead 4-0 with 3:40 left in the opening period. Moravian led 4-1 after 15 minutes of action but Rosemont scored the only goals of the second quarter, cutting the Greyhounds' advantage to 4-3 at halftime.
The Ravens then netted the opening goal of the third quarter to tie the match but back-to-back goals from Klodowski and Oriolo just 20 seconds apart late in the quarter restored the Greyhounds' lead to 6-5 after 45 minutes of action. Moravian scored the first four goals of the final quarter with a man-up goal by Klodowski pushing the lead to 10-5 with just 3:22 remaining.
The Greyhounds are scheduled to return to action on Wednesday, March 2 when the squad hosts Hood College in a non-conference match at Rocco Calvo Field starting at 3:30 p.m.
