With anticipation and excitement tangible, players and coaches alike took to Holy Cross Field Friday night with the Patriot League Tournament’s sixth and final seed there for the taking.
Just more than 2,200 fans packed the stands, and by the time 60 minutes of end-to-end action wrapped up, the Boston University men’s lacrosse team fell agonizingly short against the College of the Holy Cross. The final score was 11-7 in favor of the Crusaders (4-10, 3-5 Patriot League), and BU (8-6, 3-5 Patriot League) head coach Ryan Polley’s voice carried a noticeable tone of sorrow in the defeat’s aftermath.
“It’s obviously very hard because you put a lot of time and effort into it, and these guys worked really hard at it,” the third-year head coach said. “The goal has always been, as it was last year, to make the Patriot League Tournament, and when you come up short of your goal, it’s just really hard to swallow.”
Polley was just as quick to laud Holy Cross, highlighting how it bottled the crowd’s energy into its first-ever Patriot League Tournament appearance. The home side held a 3-1 lead at the conclusion of the first quarter and was only up 5-3 at halftime, and the contest was never truly out of hand until the Crusaders outscored BU 6-4 in the second half.
Normally resolute in containing high-profile opponents, BU fell short in that regard when the stakes were highest. The attack trio of Jack Ortlieb, Jon Vogel and Sean Wilkinson combined for eight goals, while midfielders Marc Buermann and Connor Sofield contributed a combined six points of their own.
For Polley, their contributions were key, and junior goalkeeper Christian Carson-Banister’s 12 saves ultimately couldn’t get rewarded.
“I think you hit it on the head,” Polley said when asked about Holy Cross’ standouts. “They were really excited to play tonight, there was a great crowd and the guys they needed to step up stepped up and made plays, made shots and clearly were very productive.”
As has often been the case in defeat, the box score was slightly deceiving. BU won the ground ball battle (21-18), senior Elliot Burr and junior Sam Talkow combined to win 15 of the game’s 21 draws and seven different Terriers found net.
However, BU’s Achilles’ heel arose yet again, stunting comeback efforts from the likes of freshman attack James Burr and sophomore attacks Jack Wilson and Ryan Hilburn, who combined for 10 shots. The Terriers, whose 18 turnovers per game is the second worst in the country, misplaced the ball 15 times against Holy Cross.
While time of possession isn’t recorded in college lacrosse, Polley said a vicious cycle of BU having empty possessions was too much to overcome.
“We just turned the ball over way too much,” Polley said. “We were so efficient at Loyola [University Maryland], and we were hoping that we were kind of turning the corner with our turnovers. [Holy Cross] did a really good job with having long possessions and scoring on them, and I thought they shrunk the game a little bit. When we got possession, we would just turn it over and they would have a three-minute possession.”
Even though BU scored two of the game’s last three goals through junior midfielder Adam Schaal and freshman midfielder Brendan Homire, Polley harped on how turnovers took their toll.
“It led to what felt like a game where they were in control from pretty much the opening faceoff,” Polley said. “[I] give Holy Cross a lot of credit, I just wish we valued the ball a little bit more and didn’t turn the ball over as much.”
Jonathan's a New Englander who writes about sports, features and politics. He currently covers men's hockey at BU, worked as Sports Editor during the spring 2016 semester and is on the FreeP's Board of Directors. Toss him a follow on Twitter at @jonathansigal.
