BETHLEHEM, Pa. --- The Moravian College men's lacrosse team used a 5-1 second quarter to pull away and eventually post a 14-7 victory over visiting Goucher College to open the 2019 Landmark Conference season on John Makuvek Field Saturday afternoon.
The Greyhounds, now 6-2 overall and 1-0 in conference play, had eight different players find the net including hat tricks from seniors midfielder Austin Adams and attack Mark Laratta and junior attack Cade Siddron. Laratta and Siddron each had two assists and two caused turnovers with Laratta adding two four ground balls and Adams had one assist. Senior midfielders Dominick Gurreri, and Alec Oriolo, junior midfielder Brandon Sisk, sophomore attack Connor Hull and freshman attack Connor James all scored one goal for the Hounds.
Senior attack Jack Gozzard and sophomore attack Matt Comini each had an assist for the Blue and Grey with Gozzard adding four ground balls while Gurreri and James each had two ground balls. Senior midfielder Rick Guerra was 17-for-25 on face-offs with a team-high nine ground balls while junior midfielder Peter Degnan scooped up five ground balls. Senior defender John Polich added four ground balls while sophomore defender Tanner Leslie had three ground balls and senior midfielder Robert Gellatly had a pair of caused turnovers.
Senior goalie Kurt Dick made 11 saves and scooped up four ground balls in 59 minutes of action while sophomore Will Dadouris played the final 1:22 of the match.
Moravian had a 54-31 advantage in shots, a 44-25 edge in ground balls and was 15-for-19 on clears out of the defensive end.
Adams gave the Blue and Grey a quick 1-0 lead when he scored just 45 seconds into the contest. After an own goal tied the match, Moravian scored three straight with Siddron making it a 4-1 match with 2:06 left in the first quarter. However, the Gophers scored twice in the final 1:33 to trail 4-3 after 15 minutes of action.
Laratta scored a pair of goals 1:01 into the second quarter to push the Hounds' edge to 6-3, and Adams, Oriolo and Hull scored in the next three minutes to push the lead to 9-3. Goucher scored once late in the period as the squad headed to the intermission with Moravian ahead 9-4.
The Gophers scored the only goal of the third quarter while the Greyhounds netted the first four tallies of the fourth quarter to put the match away. Siddron and Adams had man-up goals in the fourth period while Hull's tally in the second quarter also came with a man advantage.
The Hounds are slated to return to action on Saturday, March 30 when the squad heads to The Catholic University of America for a Landmark Conference contest beginning at 1:00 p.m. in Washington, D.C.
