M. Lacrosse Easily Demolishes Crusaders

This time around, Mother Nature couldn’t protect them.

Playing in a rescheduled game after being rained out earlier in the season, the Harvard men’s lacrosse team thrashed Holy Cross on Saturday in Worcester, winning 19-9 on the strength of a 10-0 run that stretched through the second, third and fourth quarters.

“It’s nice to have a game to go over the offense,” said freshman midfielder Evan Calvert. “We can prepare things to roll into [the] Dartmouth [game].”

With the victory, the Crimson (7-5, 2-3 Ivy) is guaranteed to finish the season with a winning record. In addition, Harvard is now 10-0 all-time against the Crusaders (5-9, 0-7 Patriot).

Following a Holy Cross goal that made the score 8-3 with 3:46 left in the second quarter, the Crimson started its run that put the game out of reach.

After sophomore attackman Steve Cohen got things rolling by converting a feed from captain Jeff Gottschall, sophomore attackman Sean Kane completed a hat trick and Calvert also tallied to create the halftime score of 11-3.

“We kept our offense moving, which was important,” Calvert said. “A lot of those goals were assisted goals.”

It was more of the same for Harvard after the intermission, as the team got goals from freshman attackman Greg Cohen—the team leader in points and assists—and sophomore midfielder Tom Boylan in the first five minutes of play.

Following Calvert’s second tally of the game, goals by junior attackman Mike McBride and junior midfielder David Patterson pushed the Crimson advantage to 13 at the end of the third quarter. McBride finished with a game-high seven points, including five assists.

“I was fortunate that my teammates were shooting the ball well,” McBride said. “Tom Boylan and Sean Kane made some great plays.”

With the game out of reach, Harvard had the luxury of resting some of its regulars in the fourth quarter, including captain Jake McKenna, who made 11 saves in goal. In their place, some of the team’s less-utilized players were able to gain some valuable game experience.

“It was a nice reward for those guys,” Calvert said. “Those are the guys that are pushing the guys that you see play.”

Eleven different players scored for the Crimson.

“Everybody on our team works just as hard as the next guy,” McBride said. “It was great to see everyone in there, and those guys did a great job.”

After goals by junior attackman Ford Harrington and senior attackman Anders Johnson closed out the 10-goal Harvard run and made the score 18-3, the Crusaders outscored the Crimson 6-1 in the last 10 minutes to create a more respectable final margin.

Harvard set the tone for the game early, with three goals in the first three minutes of play. After Greg Cohen put the Crimson on the board, Boylan tallied a goal before freshman midfielder Brian Mahler converted a pass from McBride on a backdoor cut to push the Harvard advantage to three.

“The best thing was that we came out and opened up,” McBride said. “We scored a couple of goals early and set the pace of the game. It got our confidence up, [because] it’s something we’ve had trouble with this season.”

Following a Holy Cross goal, Mahler and Kane each tallied in the last two minutes of the quarter to give the Crimson a 5-1 lead at the first intermission.

Holy Cross battled back, scoring the first goal of the second quarter, but Kane, McBride and Johnson each scored in a span of just over two minutes to set the stage for Harvard’s huge run.

In addition to McBride’s big day, the Crimson was paced by Kane, who had three goals and an assist, Gottschall and his three assists and Mahler’s two goals and one assist.

Harvard will close out its regular season on Saturday when it takes on Dartmouth at 7 p.m. on Jordan Field. Last season, the teams’ meeting turned into a melee, as the field was rushed by Dartmouth students, some of whom attacked and brawled with Crimson players.

“It’s going to be a very intense game, especially after last year,” said McBride, who had a hat trick in last year’s contest, a 5-4 win for the Big Green. “It’s going to be a battle.”

—Staff writer Jonathan P. Hay can be reached at hay@fas.harvard.edu.