Men's Lacrosse Falls Just Short in Ithaca

There aren’t that many things Harvard has failed to do since 1998, but beating Cornell in men’s lacrosse is one of them.

A back-and-forth affair ended when Big Red sophomore Rob Pannell scored his third goal of the game with 11 seconds left to win it for his team, 13-12, at Schoellkopf Field on Saturday.

“It’s obviously a disappointing loss,” Crimson coach John Tillman said. “I really feel for the guys. To our credit, the guys responded well, and based on what happened last week [against Duke], it would’ve been easy for them to fold their tents, but they kept working and working.”

No. 15 Harvard (5-4, 1-2 Ivy) has been inching closer to No. 10 Cornell (8-2, 3-1) over the past few years, but hasn’t quite been able to turn the tide on the Big Red.

An 11-7 loss to Cornell in 2008 was the Crimson’s slimmest deficit in four years, and Harvard followed that effort with a 13-12 loss last year. After the Big Red graduated several starters, including Tewaaraton Trophy winner Max Seibald, the Crimson and its third-best recruiting class seemed poised to finally dethrone Cornell, the modern titan of Ivy League lacrosse.

But it was not meant to be.

The Big Red opened the scoring when Ryan Hurley notched an unassisted goal one minute into the contest. Senior Jason Duboe evened the score on Harvard’s next possession with his sixth goal of the season.

Cornell scored the next four goals to take a 5-1 lead with 6:23 left in the first quarter, but sophomores Terry White and Jeff Cohen scored within 50 seconds of each other to close the gap to 5-3 at the end of the opening frame.

Each team recorded a goal in the second quarter, and Hurley nabbed his second goal of the game six minutes into the third to put the Big Red ahead, 7-4. After freshman Jack Doyle scored his career-high second goal of the game, Cohen tallied a pair in 19 seconds to tie the game. Following a Cornell penalty, Cohen found junior Dean Gibbons, who capitalized on the man-up opportunity and gave the Crimson its first lead with 43 seconds left in the third quarter.

The Big Red responded with another four-goal run, stretching its advantage to 11-8 with 5:57 left in the contest. Harvard fought right back with a four-goal streak of its own, taking a 12-11 lead with three minutes left in the game when Gibbons scored his second man-up goal of the contest.

It took Pannell just 17 seconds to even the score with his second goal of the game. Cornell regained possession after the faceoff, and after a long set of pick and rolls, Pannell put a move on sophomore Daniel DiMaria and rifled it past Crimson freshman goalie Harry Krieger for the game-winning goal with only 11 seconds on the clock.

“I’m pretty disappointed,” Cohen said. “I thought we had them right where we wanted them.”

One bright spot for Harvard throughout the game was Krieger’s continued emergence as a force between the pipes. A week after recording a career-high 17 saves against Duke, Krieger stopped 14 Big Red shots Saturday and has taken a stronger hold of the starting goalie position after splitting time with sophomore Christian Coates earlier in the season.

“Harry certainly hasn’t done anything to lose the job...he played well enough for us to win,” Tillman said. “Any time you can get 14 saves out of your goaltender, you expect to win that ball game.”

With only three games remaining and a 1-2 record in conference play, the Crimson must likely win out if it hopes to earn an NCAA tournament berth.

“We can only control our effort and focus,” Tillman said. “I don’t think it’s time well spent worrying about the big picture. What we need to do is see where we can improve and take it practice by practice.”

One aspect that has cost Harvard dearly this season is allowing opponents to string together crushing runs. Georgetown used a 6-1 run to help it defeat the Crimson, 13-12, Brown was able to fend off Harvard, 13-11, with a 5-1 first quarter, and Duke’s 8-0 first quarter was all the offense it needed in defeating the Crimson, 14-5.

“It’s definitely been a pattern for us, and I’m not really sure what we can do,” Cohen said. “I wish there was some switch we could just flip on, but I think that if we just stay more focused and keep our goals for the season in mind, we’ll be fine.”

—Staff writer Colin Whelehan can be reached at whelehan@fas.harvard.edu.