Despite Thrilling Comeback, Centenary Cyclones Fall 13-9

(4/2/08) Earlier this afternoon the Centenary Men’s Lacrosse team dropped a hard fought non-conference contest with the University of Scranton by the final of 13-9. Despite the margin of victory, the game was tied with just over six minutes remaining and certainly could have gone either way.

The visiting Royals (7-2) jumped in front early scoring twice in the opening seven minutes of play. Centenary (1-7) would strike once in the first quarter on an unassisted goal by Jason Reig (Long Valley/West Morris), to pull within one after one period of play. The two team’s traded two goals each, again through the first seven minutes, keeping the margin at one 4-3. From there Scranton took control scoring three more times to close the quarter and head into halftime with a commanding 7-3 advantage.

The second half began much like the first as the Royals struck first, pushing the cushion to 8-3. However, over the next 17 minutes (final eight of the third quarter and the opening nine of the fourth) the host Cyclones dominated the score board running off six goals to Scranton’s one. The final tally came on Rory Murray’s (Cranford/Seton Hall Prep/photo right) fourth goal of the game, and it pulled the Cyclones even at 9-9. With just over six minutes left in the game, Centenary found themselves in the middle of a down to the wire finish. Unfortunately for the Cyclones, the Royals picked up the following face-off and Christian Dugan found the back of the net less than a minute later to put the visitor’s back in front. Over the final five minutes of play, Scranton would notch three more goals to push the score to the final margin of 13-9 and notch their seventh victory of the year.

Click here for the full press release and here for the box score.