The men’s lacrosse team fell in its season opener to No. 3 Maryland 11-6 at Capital One Field in College Park, Md. in front of a crowd of 1,888.

Much of the game seemed to be a stalemate as the two teams battled back and forth. Proving to be strong defensively, the Bison held a tough Maryland attack scoreless through eight minutes. Reed Malas ’19 scored the unassisted opening goal of the game to give the Bison a 1-0 lead. Maryland responded by scoring three goals to extend their lead to 3-1. The Orange and Blue were able to cut the deficit to one in the closing minute of the first quarter with an unassisted goal from Will Yorke ’20.

“Our defense played great the entire game. Maryland has a very strong offense and we were definitely able to frustrate them throughout the game,” Malas said. “Christian Klipstein [’19] played phenomenally in goal. He is the leader of our defense and he made a lot of incredible saves that kept us in the game. The rest of our defense worked really well together throughout the game.”

After Maryland scored early in the second quarter, Ryan Durkin ’19 responded for the Bison with a goal, but the Terrapins scored in the waning minutes of the first half to hold the 5-3 advantage going into halftime.

Building on their momentum, Maryland would go on to add two goals within two minutes of each other early in the second half. Malas answered with his second tally of the game, bringing the Orange and Blue back to within three points. However, Maryland scored two goals at the end of the period, taking a 9-4 lead into the fourth quarter, and hung on during the final period for the 11-6 win.

A few first-years saw action in the fourth quarter in their first collegiate game. Matthew Barkauskas ’22 scored on an assist from Alston Tarry ’22. Tarry went on to score his first collegiate goal, but Maryland was able to fend off the Bison comeback.

“Scoring my first goal was unbelievable. I am thankful that I got the chance to not only play, but score against a team I have watched for so long, so I was pretty excited when I saw it go in,” Barkauskas said.

As the stat line suggests, the Bison remained competitive throughout the entire game, as they were only outshot 35-32 and lost the face-off battle 13-8.

“With it being the first game of the season, I think that we need to improve in all areas. Specifically, I think that our offense could have been a bit sharper at times. We were able to generate a lot of great scoring opportunities, but when you go against a program like Maryland that is consistently competing for a National Championship, you have to capitalize on every chance that you get,” Malas said. “That being said, we had a lot of young guys playing in their first college game so I am really proud of the effort that we showed. I think that we will only grow from this game.”

The Orange and Blue will look to get their first win of the season when they host Bryant on Feb. 10 at 1 p.m.