Reed Dempsey

Senior Writer

The men’s lacrosse team travelled to Hamilton, N.Y. on April 20 to face the Colgate Raiders. Four assists from David Dickson ’15 and an 8-1 second half run propelled the Bison to a 13-8 win and secured the second seed for this weekend’s Patriot League Tournament.

Sean Doyle ’16 opened the day’s scoring with an unassisted tally at the 9:54 mark, but the lead only lasted for two minutes as the Raiders added a goal of their own to level the contest at one.

Doyle again found the back of the net, sparking a three-goal Bison run that included goals by Ryan Joseph ’15 and Thomas Flibotte ’16. The 4-1 lead would hold for just a minute as Colgate scored with just under two minutes left in the first quarter.

Early in the second quarter, the Raiders took advantage of a man-up situation, following a pushing call against the Bison, pulling the game back within one. As time was winding down in the first half, Kyle O’Keefe ’13 took a feed from Alex Spring ’16 and fired off a shot that crossed the goal line as time expired, bringing the score to 5-3 in favor of the Bison.

In the opening eight minutes of the second half, the Orange and Blue surrendered four straight goals and the lead.

“We had some unforced turnovers during that stretch which we really could have limited. Some Colgate defensemen made a couple of nice plays and picked off a few passes … we just weren’t moving our feet hard enough and it cost us for a little,” Dickson said.

Head coach Frank Fedorjaka then pulled his all-league goalie, Kyle Feeney ’13, in favor of Sam Grinberg ’15. Grinberg was no stranger to this move, having replaced Feeney in a win against Drexel a year ago, making 11 saves and leading the Bison to victory.

“When I first got in, we were down 7-5, and I basically told the defense that we had Colgate where we wanted them,” Grinberg said. “The whole season we have battled back from deficits, so even after giving up four straight, I think the team was still confident that we would make a run and take the lead back.”

In the minutes following the switch, Doyle reignited the Bison offense off of a Chase Bailey ’13 feed, before Tom Black ’14 added a goal of his own on an extra-man opportunity, tying the game at seven.

Colgate then found the back of the net on its first shot against Grinberg, but the Orange and Blue defense then settled down, limiting the Raiders to just seven shots during the final period of play, and Ryan Gutowski ’13 dominated faceoffs down the stretch.

On the offensive side of the field, the Bison exploded for six goals, including two from Bailey and individual tallies from Todd Heritage ’14, Peter Burke ’14, Doyle and Flibotte.

“[The team] just got back to the basics and started to play loose but also with a sense of urgency,” Dickson said. “We ran a few set plays that worked beautifully and then our offense just started to flow.”

During that final 8-1 run, Dickson tallied four assists. Dickson ended the night with 42 assists total this season, a new Bison single-season record.

With the win, the Bison secured the second seed for this weekend’s Patriot League Tournament and will face Army Friday at 4:30 p.m. in Bethlehem, Pa.