Bucknell University Athletics
Bucknell University
Colgate (PL Semifinals)
Bucknell Men's Lax Comeback Attempt Falls Just Shy in 11-10 PL Tournament Loss to Colgate
4/27/2007 8:00:00 AM | Men's Lacrosse
April 27, 2007
ANNAPOLIS, Md. - The 16th-ranked Bucknell men's lacrosse team nearly pulled off an improbable comeback, scoring four times in a span of 1:24 in the closing minutes, but Colgate goalie Tim Harrington made a game-saving stop of a Nick Marks shot with 15 seconds left to lift the 19th-ranked Raiders to an 11-10 win over the Bison Friday night in a Patriot League Tournament semifinal game at Navy-Marine Corps Stadium.
Patriot League Offensive Player of the Year Brandon Corp had three goals and four assists and Kevin Colleluori scored four goals for the Raiders (10-4), who advance to Sunday's championship game against top-seeded Navy.
Freshman Tim Brandau scored four goals for Bucknell (11-4), including three tallies in a 32-second flash in what implausibly turned into an incredible finish. Collelouri's extra-man goal with 6:42 left in the game gave Colgate a seemingly commanding 11-6 lead.
With 2:49 left John Togneri scored what at the time seemed like a harmless goal on a hard lefty shot from deep on the left side. Things got interesting when middie Steve Case came up with a great takeaway at midfield just after the faceoff then assisted on Brandau's goal with 1:47 left.
Just 22 seconds later Bucknell's 10-man ride forced yet another turnover and Austin Winter found Brandau for a point-blank goal to make it 11-9. On the ensuing faceoff, Case grabbed yet another loose ball and fed Brandau in the same spot on the left side of the crease. For the second time in 10 seconds, Brandau faked high and dumped a point-blank shot past Harrington, and stunningly it was 11-10 with 1:25 left.
The Bison had won only 4 of 24 faceoffs to that point, but on the biggest draw of the night Michael Cooke stymied Chris Eck and the X, allowing Brian Gargan to swoop in for the ground ball, and Bucknell had a final possession to tie.
After one Bucknell contested shot slid wide, inside 20 seconds to play Marks dodged two defenders and sidearmed a waist-high shot that Harrington grabbed with his crosse. The freshman goalie made an errant outlet pass, though, and the Bison had one more possession with eight seconds to play. Colin Hulme, the Patriot League Defensive Player of the Year, forced Winter away from the goal on the restart, and with time winding down Winter's pass toward the front of the crease was knocked away, and the Raiders escaped with the victory and their first-ever berth in the league championship game.
Colgate got off to a great start in this one, breaking up a scoreless duel with three goals in the final 51 seconds of the first quarter and two more in the first 5:07 of the second. Bucknell finally got on the board on Winter's goal with 7:58 left in the first half, and Cooke followed it up with another tally just 31 seconds later to bring the Bison within 5-2 at intermission.
Trailing 6-2 in the third quarter, Bucknell potted three in a row from Winter, Perry Menzies and Togneri to make it 6-5 after three. Things appeared to slip away from the Bison when Brendan Hurley came up with back-to-back assists on goals by Corp and Jeff Hiller in the first four minutes of the fourth quarter.
Brandau got one back for the Bison at the 10:46 mark on a highlight-reel goal. With his back to the cage he tossed in a reverse underhanded shot to make it 8-6, but Colleluori scored twice and Hiller once to spread the margin to 11-6, setting the stage for the wild finish.
Bucknell is now 0-3 in Patriot League Tournament play, with all three losses coming by a single goal. The Bison were trying to equal the school record for wins in a season set by the 1996 team, and now they will have to wait to see about an NCAA Tournament at-large bid.
Colgate dominated the ground ball category by a 50-30 margin. Will Planer finished with 12 ground balls and Eck 10 for the Raiders, who won 20 of the 25 draws, all taken by Eck. Colgate outshot the Bison 34-33.
It was a tough night for the two outstanding young goalies, both of whom faced a bevy of point-blank range shots. Bucknell's Nick Sciubba, who entered the game as the national leader in goals-against average and save percentage, finished with five saves and five ground balls. Harrington also had five stops, none bigger than the one in the closing seconds.
The Bison were again outstanding in transition. They successfully cleared the ball 17 of 20 times, while Colgate was only 8 of 16.
