Princeton had five goals, Virginia had four. It was the beginning of the fourth quarter. Virginia had both the momentum and possession of the ball.
The Cavaliers' sizeable contingent among the 4,315 fans at 1952 Stadium at Saturday's men's lacrosse game was on its feet as Virginia mounted an attack. Finally, after sustained control by No. 3 Virginia (1-2), No. 2 Princeton (2-0) was able to knock the ball loose. With possession of the ball such a vital part in lacrosse, both teams frantically scrambled for control.
After the melee was over, Princeton came out with the ball and was able to mount an attack of its own.
The Tigers were able to quickly move through the midfield and get the ball in the hands of sophomore midfielder Owen Daly, who was roaming the middle third of the field. Upon receiving the ball, he faked at trying to beat his man to head goalward. Instead, Daly passed it to sophomore attacker Will MacColl who was dashing from the left side towards the goal. In one fluid movement, MacColl beat his defender, snared the pass from Daly, gracefully tiptoed around the goalie crease, faked a shot up high, and then slyly slid the ball down low into the back of the net.
This goal, scored four minutes, 18 seconds into the fourth quarter, gave the Tigers a 6-4 lead and destroyed the momentum of the Cavaliers — momentum that Virginia would be unable to regain. The Tigers rolled on from there to take an 8-4 victory over a powerful national foe.
This goal was the first of three points from MacColl. Later in the fourth quarter, he would tally another goal and assist senior forward and captain Matt Striebel on Striebel's third goal of the game.
What makes MacColl's scoring outburst so frightening for Princeton's future opponents is that the sophomore is the seventh attackman in Princeton's rotation, showing the depth of talent from which Princeton may choose.
"I can't say enough about a guy like Will MacColl," head coach Bill Tierney said. "He's our seventh attackman and comes in to score two big goals for us."
The game started with Princeton's senior midfielder Rob Torti and sophomore attackman Sean Hartofolis getting a goal each before three minutes had ticked off the clock.
The lead was short-lived, however, as Virginia notched two goals of its own before the end of the quarter.
During the second and third quarters, the two squads battled back and forth on the scoreboard, with Princeton taking a 5-4 lead at the end of the third on two goals by Striebel and one by freshman midfielder Ryan Boyle.
Despite putting eight goals past Virginia's defense, coach Tierney was still not satisfied with the offensive output in both this game and the Mar. 3 meeting with Johns Hopkins that Princeton also won with a final score of 8-4.
"We'd like to score more than eight goals. We need to do that," coach Tierney said, acknowledging that eight will not always result in a win. "But to allow four goals to teams like Virginia and Johns Hopkins, we have to be happy."
After last week's game with the Blue Jays, coach Tierney expressed disapproval with the transition between the defense and offense as well as the number of faceoffs won.
"We worked hard all week at winning faceoffs as well as clearing the ball. It's nice to get it done."
Although Princeton would have liked to score more points in the last two contests, it cannot complain about the 41 shots it was able to create against Virginia.
Maybe even more impressive than the shots it took, though, is that Princeton allowed the Cavaliers only 17 shots the entire game and limited first-team All-America Conor Gill to a single assist.
"I thought our defense held tough and that [senior goalie] Trevor [Tierney] made the saves when he had to," coach Tierney said.
"We try to win games on defense. Championships are won that way, and we've got an experienced defense."
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