UNC Outlasts 'Cuse, 17-15

Saturday, April 11

Chapel Hill, NC

4 pm

Syracuse University

8-2, 2-2ACC

North Carolina

12-1, 3-0ACC

Syracuse

North Carolina

Photo by: Michael J. Okoniewski

4/11/2015 7:35:00 PM | Men's Lacrosse

Box Score

Donahue and Galasso combine for eight goals in loss

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. – No. 2 Syracuse (8-2, 2-2 ACC) roared back from a six-goal deficit in the fourth quarter, but could not overtake No. 4 North Carolina (12-1, 3-0 ACC) and lost to the Tar Heels, 17-15, in front of a sell-out crowd of 6,004 Saturday, April 11 at Fetzer Field.

"Hand it to our guys for continuing to play," Orange head coach John Desko said. "We put ourselves in a situation where we could have possibly tied the game had we scored on the man-up and gotten a faceoff or two more down the stretch. It didn't happen, but we played like it could have happened."

Syracuse trailed the entire game and fell behind 14-7 in the third quarter, and 17-11 after consectutive goals by Joey Sankey, including an extra-man score with 9:17 to go in regulation.

Then the Orange came alive.

Kevin Rice ignited a late 4-0 run when he scored unassisted at the 7:59 mark. Goals by Dylan Donahue, Hakeem Lecky and Tom Grimm followed to make it 17-15 with 1:52 remaining.

North Carolina's Stephen Kelly won the ensuing faceoff, but Peter Macartney stripped Shane Simpson to get the ball back for Syracuse. Once in the offensive end Desko called timeout. There was 1:20 left to play and 30 seconds remaining on an unnecessary roughness penalty to Sankey.

On the restart, Syracuse probed the Carolina zone before UNC's Jake Bailey forced a turnover on Rice with less than 30 seconds left. Evan Connell picked up the ground ball and the Tar Heels ran out the clock to end SU's four-game series winning streak.

Donahue paced the Orange with six points, including a game-high five goals. Nicky Galasso scored three goals against his former team in his first game at Fetzer Field since transferring from UNC to Syracuse after the 2012 season.

Luke Goldstock led the Tar Heels with four goals. He also contributed an assist to finish with five points. Chad Tutton had three goals, while Sankey, Simpson, Jimmy Bitter and Peyton Klawinski all had two for UNC.

Early in the game, Syracuse had several good looks, but couldn't solve UNC goalie Kieran Burke. Burke made eight first-quarter saves and several more Syracuse shots hit the post.

With Burke standing tall, the Tar Heels scored the first five goals of the game and led 5-1 after the opening period.

Syracuse got untracked in the second quarter and closed the gap to two on four occasions (5-3, 6-4, 7-5, 8-6) before consecutive goals by Tate Jozokos and Tutton late in the period extended the Tar Heels' advantage to 10-6 at halftime.

In the third quarter, back-to-back goals by Goldstock in the first three minutes stretched the UNC lead to 12-6. The two sides traded goals for the most part after that until Syracuse made its final push.

Burke finished with 17 saves to earn the win. Orange goalies Bobby Wardwell and Warren Hill combined for 10 saves on the day. Wardwell had four stops in 31:52. Hill replaced Wardwell at the start of the third quarter and played the majority of the second half, registering six saves in his first extended action since the season opener against Siena on Feb. 7.

Syracuse held the edge in faceoffs (21-14) and ground balls (35-28). Sophomore Ben Williams attempted every draw for the Orange and won 13-of-18 (.722) in the first half before Kelly and UNC evened things up after intermission.

The Orange returns to the Carrier Dome for its regular-season home finale on Tuesday, April 14 against Central New York rival Hobart. Faceoff is at 7 p.m. on Time Warner Cable SportsChannel.

Game Notes: Williams picked up nine ground balls to become the fourth SU player to record 100 ground balls in a season. He upped his total for the year to 105, which ranks third on the Orange's single-season record list behind Sam Bassett (164 in 2000) and Toby Price (126 in 1996) … Randy Staats registered three assists in his return to the Orange lineup. Staats missed the previous three games with a lower-body injury … Tim Barber scored a goal in the second quarter to extend his goal-scoring streak to seven games … Rice's fourth-quarter tally pushed his streak to 25 consecutive games with a goal … Syracuse is locked in as the No. 3 seed in the upcoming ACC Championship and will play the loser of next weekend's game between North Carolina and Notre Dame in the semifinals on April 24 … Sankey finished with two goals and one assist to become UNC's all-time leading scorer. Sankey has career 214 points, eclipsing Marcus Holman's previous record of 213.