For Immediate Release: May 4, 2005
Contact: Thomas Moore II (sports@binghamton.edu)
Phone: 607-777-2956

Binghamton men's lacrosse season ends to #2 seed Albany 11-3 in AE semifinal

Box Score

ALBANY, N.Y.--#2 seed Albany (9-5) was up 4-3 at halftime then finished the game on a 7-0 run defeating #3 seed Binghamton (4-9) 11-3 in an America East semifinal on Wednesday afternoon at University Field. Albany who is currently nationally ranked at number 17 held Binghamton's offense over the final 32 minutes scoreless. This is the second strait year that Albany ended the Bearcats postseason, last season the Great Danes defeated the Bearcats in the Americas East Championship game 10-4.

Brendan Russell struck first with an unassisted goal for Albany with 11:26 to play in the first quarter. Junior midfielder Joe Conner (Ijamsville, Md.) tied the game up at 1-1 with an unassisted goal at the 8:58 mark. Luke Daquino scored with 3:17 remaining in the first quarter to give the Great Danes a one goal advantage.

Merrick Thomson scored to open the second quarter, giving Albany the 3-1 advantage. Sophomore attack Jeff Santucci (Cicero, N.Y.) scored at the 5:17 mark on assist from junior midfield Matt DeCirce (Binghamton, N.Y.) puting the Bearcats within a goal. Russell scored his second goal of the game 45 seconds later to give Albany the 4-2 advantage. Sophomore attack Jeff Kaylor (Beverly, Mass.) scored the final Bearcat goal of the game with 2:25 left to play in the half.

With Binghamton down 4-3 at the half, Albany scored seven unanswered goals in the second half to break the game open. Five of the goals came in the third quarter, two in the fourth.

Junior goalie Kevin McKeown (Brewster, N.Y.) made seven saves in goal during his 53:56 minutes in the net, freshman goalie Jeff Walker (Rochester, N.Y.) made no saves while allowing one goal in his 6:04 minutes in the net. Kevin Rae made 11 saves and allowed three goals for Albany.

"They wore us down towards the end of the first half," head coach Ed Stephenson said. "The game became too physical for us and thats when they started winning the ground balls and faceoffs."

Albany outshot Binghamton 27-24. Albany won the ground ball battle, collecting 42 of the 76 ground balls.

NOTES: Binghamton concludes its fourth season of varsity and Division I competition with a 4-9 overall record. Nine of the 13 games the Bearcats played were against an opponent who was nationally ranked during the 2005 season.