Leopards Fall to Babson in Season Opener

(Courtesy of Babson College Sports Information)

BABSON PARK, Mass. – The Babson College men's lacrosse team defeated visiting Wentworth Institute of Technology, 12-4, for its first victory of the season and the first career win for Babson first-year head coach Brendan Gorman. Babson was led by junior attacker Armand Wilson (Fairfield, Conn.), who finished with three goals. With the win, Babson improves to 1-1 on the season while the Leopards start out at 0-1.

Babson scored the first goal of the game just over two minutes in when senior co-captain Max Artz (Gates Mills, Ohio) found teammate sophomore Thomas Mallon (Manhasset, N.Y.) in front of the net to put the Beavers up 1-0. Wentworth answered at the 7:57 mark when first-year Mark Pappas (Worcester, Mass.) scored an unassisted goal to tie the game 1-1. Babson then went on to score three unanswered goals to gain the momentum going into the second quarter.

Sophomore Paul Grip (Shrewsbury, Mass.) kept the scoring going when he received a pass from sophomore midfielder Cam Caruso (St. Charles, Ill.) to give the Beavers the 5-1 advantage with 12:42 remaining in the half. Pappas struck again for Wentworth at the 10:05 mark but the Leopards were unable to get any closer as Wilson added the final goal of the half with nine seconds remaining to put the Beavers up, 6-2, entering the break.

Babson went on to score an additional six goals in the second half while the Beaver defense allowed only two second half scores by the Leopards en route to the 12-4 victory.

Along with Wilson's game high three goals, Mallon finished with two goals and two assists for four points and was followed by Artz and sophomore Thomas Cykana (Minnetonka, Minn.) who each chipped in two goals and one assist. Grip finished with two goals and sophomore Scott Schachter (Rumford, R.I.) chipped in with one goal. Junior defender Christian Ebert (Boxford, Mass.) picked up 11 groundballs and junior Ryan Kucinski (Cohasset, Mass.) chipped in with seven.

For Wentworth, Pappas finished with two unassisted goals and junior Matt Cox (Granger, Ind.) and first-year Tyler Forthofer (Glastonbury, Conn.) both added one unassisted goal each. Sophomore Mike Swenson (East Lyme, Conn.) won 13 of 18 face-offs and finished with a game-high 13 groundballs.

Babson senior co-captain Mike Saucier (Nashua, N.H.) played all 60 minutes in net for the Beavers, making eight saves. Senior Sean Tobin (Silver Spring, Md.) made five saves in the first half for Wentworth while first-years Jared Proulx (Nashua, N.H.) and  Alex Matses (North Andover, Mass.) combined for eight saves in the second half.

Babson returns to action on Saturday when they host Union College at 1 p.m. Wentworth will continue play on March 17th when they visit Massachusetts Maritime Academy for a 7 p.m. game.