The No. 6 men's lacrosse team defeated Western New England 18-7 on Tuesday in Springfield, Mass. The Jumbos improve to 6-1 on the season and now ride a two-game winning streak after their loss last week to defending national champion No. 4 Stevenson.
Leading the way for the Jumbos were senior tri-captain midfielder Beau Wood, who notched five goals and two assists, junior attackman Cole Bailey, who recorded one goal and three assists and sophomore attacker John Uppgren, who added two goals and three assists. Senior goalkeeper Patton Watkins also had a season-high 17 saves on the game.
Similar to Saturday's victory over Trinity, Tufts got out to a fast start, scoring the first four goals in the game. After giving up one goal to Western New England senior Adam Knapton in the sixth minute, the Jumbos went on another 5-0 run to end the quarter up 9-1. Six different Jumbos tallied points in the first quarter -- including Wood, Bailey, Uppgren, senior tri-captain defenseman Kane Delaney and junior midfielder Ryan Le -- all of whom contributed to a prodigious offensive assault and helped the Jumbos outshoot the Golden Bears by a margin of 21-8.
"The biggest thing was our ability to win face-offs," Wood said. "That definitely got us the ball without them ever getting a possession for our first seven to eight goals. We also did very well on groundballs, which was another way we gave the offense procession."
Tufts scored quickly again in the second quarter with two goals in the first four minutes, increasing its lead to 11. The Jumbos then continued on a 3-0 run fueled by goals from sophomore midfielders Garrett Clarke and Peter Gill. Western New England scored two goals late in the quarter, but Tufts tacked on one more to increase the lead to 15-4. Tufts outshot Western New England only 14-13 in the period, but, unlike the home team, it was able to convert on its opportunities.
After a first half that saw a combined 19 goals scored, the pace of the second half slowed down immensely. No goals were scored for the first five minutes of the third quarter until Wood netted his fifth goal, unassisted, right before the six-minute mark. Western New England went on to close the quarter with two goals, but failed to capitalize on 12 other shot attempts.
"Western New England is a team we have a great amount of respect for," head coach Mike Daly said. "We were pretty lucky to get off to such a good start mid-week on the road, but our guys also did a great job coming off of that bus and being ready. Western New England is a proud program, and they just kept coming at us."
Goals continued to evade Tufts through the fourth quarter. The Jumbos scored the first two goals of the quarter, one from sophomore midfielder Kyle Howard-Johnson and one from senior midfielder Matt Montgomery, which was the first of his Tufts career. The Golden Bears tacked on one more goal with 31 seconds left in the game to leave the final score at 18-7.
After seven games, the Jumbos remain one of the top offensive teams in the nation. Since Tuesday's victory against Western New England, Tufts has gone from third to first in the nation for total offense, averaging 19.0 goals per game. Tufts' attack has been both potent and well-balanced, evinced no more conspicuously than in its victory over Western New England, in which 13 Tufts players recorded points.
"We have great players first and foremost," Daly said, referring to the team's offensive success this season. "Coach [Taylor] Harris, coach [Sean] Kirwan and coach [Scott] Rynne all do a great job with the facets of the game that lead to all that scoring, and it really is a reflection of our team."
Tufts' defense has also played well, limiting opponents to single-digit scoring in four of its last five games.
"On offense we push it so fast that we sometimes turn it over, which puts a lot of pressure on our defense," Wood said. "They've been doing a great job of holding [the] teams we've been playing to low numbers."
Junior attacker Chris Schoenhut also recorded three more goals against Western New England to increase his season total to a team-high 29. Through Saturday's game against Trinity he is ranked fifth in the nation with 4.17 goals per game.
Tufts' next game is this Saturday at home against the 6-2 Connecticut College Camels.
