On Saturday, No. 3 men’s lacrosse (6–2 overall, 2–1 Ivy League) defeated No. 28 Brown (5–4, 0–2) 20–14 with a lights-out offensive performance from senior midfielders Chad Palumbo and John Dunphey.
“The guys played really unselfishly and were able to capitalize on some great opportunities,” Head Coach Matt Madalon told The Daily Princetonian. “Between Dunphey and Palumbo, those are some impressive stat-lines.”
The Tigers set the tone early and scored their first goal during their first possession, coming off the stick of junior midfielder Tucker Wade. Dunphey then added the second goal for the Tigers at the 13:34 mark. If there was any early indication of how the game would pan out, this was it.
The Bears made their own run after that. Their offensive spurt tied the game up at two goals each, for a total of four goals in four minutes from these two teams.
Brown notched another after stopping Princeton from clearing the ball. But in the gameplay following that Brown goal, the Tigers’ momentum was hard to beat.
Palumbo scored off a broken play to make the score 3–3. Then, he scored again to make the score 4–3, and rocketed in a third with a minute to go in the opening quarter. Senior face-off specialist Andrew McMeekin broke up the Palumbo scoring show by taking it straight to the rack himself off of the faceoff. Palumbo ended the first 15 minutes of play with a behind-the-back assist to junior attacker Colin Burns, who then scored his 100th goal. He is the 40th Princeton player in history to reach this milestone.
When Palumbo is producing, Princeton is winning. The Tigers led 7–3 after the first quarter.
In the second quarter, Dunphey added to the Tigers’ run, making the score 8–3. Brown then put a stop to Princeton’s momentum by scoring a goal off their man-up opportunity, caused by a Tiger holding penalty. The teams then exchanged goals, with Palumbo getting on the board again for the Orange and Black. Sophomore attacker Aidan McDonald joined the action after that, bringing the score to 10–4.
Going into the break, the Tigers led 11–5, courtesy of another goal from Palumbo.
“I think that message of taking advantage of every little play was quite prominent this week in practice and translated into today’s game,” Dunphey told the ‘Prince.’
In the third quarter, the Tigers took over even more. In just 15 minutes, Princeton scored seven goals, and Brown couldn’t seem to keep up, unable to score consecutively without a Tiger interruption.
Going into the fourth quarter, Princeton was on top, 18–9.
At the start of the fourth, Brown scored first and held Princeton to 20–31 clears on the day. The Bears looked for a late surge to tighten the game, but, after losing a league game to Cornell, this league matchup turned the pressure up for Princeton, and, despite the Bears’ defensive efforts, Princeton prevailed.
“Any time you go into those league games, we put that pressure on ourselves,” Madalon said to the ‘Prince.’
Brown did outscore Princeton in the fourth quarter, but Princeton came out on top. Senior attacker Jackson Kane found the back of the net with only one second left. That topped off a decisive 20–14 win for the Tigers.
“We really focused on playing to our principles today,” Dunphey told the ‘Prince.’ “We pride ourselves on controlling our energy, attitude, and toughness, and this week we really focused on winning the sudden change moments of the game, something we struggled with against Cornell.”
Princeton will next face No. 30 Lehigh on Sherrerd Field at 7 p.m. on Tuesday, March 31.
Emilia Reay is a senior Sports writer for the ‘Prince.’
Please send any corrections to corrections[at]dailyprincetonian.com.
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