Facing a win-or-go-home situation, the Tufts E-Men defeated Boston College 11-8 Tuesday night on Bello Field, earning the last bid to the New England Open Regionals and sending the Spoonheads packing.
The contest, which served as the final game of the Metro Boston Open Sectionals, had been delayed from its originally scheduled April 15 match due to inclement weather in Lancaster, Mass. MIT, Northeastern, Harvard and Boston University secured the first through fourth bids to sectionals after the April 14-15 weekend of play, leaving the fifth and final bid up for grabs between Tufts and BC and necessitating a make-up game.
"It feels really good," said junior co-captain Eli Blackman, who is also a Daily editor. "There was some pressure on this game and we knew that if we lost this we wouldn't play anymore [this season], and for Tufts, not going to regionals, I don't know if that's ever happened, so there was definitely some pressure riding on it."
In a rare home game that drew a small crowd, the E-Men did not disappoint, stringing together a close and hard-fought contest. Tufts had played BC earlier during sectionals play, defeating the Spoonheads 15-11.
Tufts drew blood first under the lights on Bello's turf field, scoring the first three points of the game and later going up 5-1 on BC. The Spoonheads battled back to bring the game to 6-4 but never got closer than two points away from the E-Men. In fact, starting at 6-3, Tufts and BC alternated every single score until the E-Men notched the game-clinching 11th point.
"I felt like when we played a couple of weekends ago [against BC] we were more in control the whole game, whereas this game they put together a couple of runs," Blackman said. "They were throwing a tough zone at us and we felt like maybe we were struggling against them, but we definitely had confidence that we could put it together, finish the effort and get the win."
During the first day of sectionals play April 14, which featured 18 teams divided into four different pools, the E-Men romped Harvard's B Team 15-4 before shutting out Olin College 15-0. Tufts then overcame BC, sending the E-Men to the Championship Bracket the next day.
The team ran into tougher competition there, falling to eventual sectional champion MIT 9-5 followed by a 13-3 loss at the hands of Northeastern. Tufts bounced back with a 13-7 win over Bentley, which left the E-Men facing the Spoonheads again, this time with a bid to New England Open Regionals on the line.
"I think we knew we had a strong team the whole time, it just didn't come out well in that tournament a couple of weeks ago," junior co-captain Daniel Resnick said. "We knew we had to come back and work hard, and we had a couple of early morning practices on Saturday and Sunday, and we put it all together and worked on some stuff, and we're glad to have a nice night."
Sixteen teams from greater New England will join Tufts, MIT, Northeastern, Harvard and Boston University at Dartmouth in Hanover, N.H. for Regionals during the weekend of May 5. Tournament play consists of a double-elimination 16-team bracket, with the top two teams advancing to the 2007 UPA College Championships, held in Columbus, Ohio the weekend of May 25.
"We always build up to [New England] Regionals, since that's our tournament to possibly go to nationals," Resnick said. "We're just doing what we're doing, still practicing hard. We're going to have some weekend practices, and just gear up for Regionals. Nothing too special, just keep working on the holes in our game and putting it all together."
Successful in their must-win game over BC, the E-Men confidently look ahead to regional competition with their eyes on a few local nemeses.
"Harvard is always a rival, [along with] Dartmouth [and] Brown," Blackman said. "Northeastern has come on strong this year, we'd like to see them again, maybe MIT. The region is really wide open, so it could go either way and we feel like we have as good a shot as any team."
