Early lead eases #15 Endicott to 14-8 road win against Salve Regina

MIDDLETOWN, R.I. – Sharp Jones (Scituate, Mass.) led all players with four goals as Salve Regina University men's lacrosse outscored the #15 Endicott College team, 8-7, in the final three periods. Unfortunately, the visiting Gulls jumped out to an 8-0 lead en route to a 14-8 victory over Commonwealth Coast Conference (CCC) opponent Seahawks on Saturday evening as the Gulls improved to 10-3 overall and 6-0 in conference play. The Blue and Green were led by four points from both junior attacker Nick Pinciaro (Beverly, Mass.) and freshman attacker Colin Bannon (Westport, Conn.) as well as 19 face-off wins and 14 ground balls from freshman Tommy Hughes (Coram, N.Y.).

Endicott now looks ahead to a match up with CCC rival Western New England (6-6, 5-0), the only other team in the conference with an unbeaten league record, on Tuesday, April 15 at 7 pm in Endicott Stadium. Tuesday's match up will be a rematch of two of the last three CCC Championships including last year's showdown between the Gulls and Golden Bears that saw Western New England outlast Endicott 9-5.

In Saturday's conference game against Salve Regina, Endicott quickly raced out to a 7-0 lead after the first quarter as seven different goal scorers found the back of the net. Junior Kyle Weber (West Hartford, Conn.) started off the scoring 1:33 into the game with the first of his two goals followed by a strike off the stick of junior midfielder Jeremy Morgan (Lake Panamoka, N.Y.), his 24th of the season. After Morgan's goal, Hughes won the ensuing draw and scored his second goal of the season just six seconds later.

Senior defensive midfielder Jonny Kovach (Shaker Heights, Ohio) netted his first of the season, from Bannon, followed 14 seconds later by Jonathan Morgan (Lake Panamoka, N.Y.), unassisted, to make it 5-0. With under four minutes left in the opening quarter, Endicott tacked on two more goals as sophomore Ben Katzen (Blauvelt, N.Y.) scored his first collegiate goal and Bannon tallied his first of two goals with 2:48 remaining in the first.

Three minutes and forty one seconds into the second quarter, Endicott completed their eight goal unanswered streak to start the game as Pinciaro scored an unassisted goal, his first of a hat trick in the win. Freshman Nick LoCicero (Lynbrook, N.Y.) and Chad Hollenshade (Lutherville, Md.) made it 8-2 with second period goals before Bannon and Pinciaro scored back-to-back with 50 and 30 seconds remaining to cap of the first half scoring at 10-2.

Jones had the first and last goals of the third period, and was joined by Dan Parks (Nesconset, N.Y.) who scored his 19th of the season in the first 15 minutes of the second half. 

For the Gulls in the second half, Pinciaro completed his hat trick at the 4:56 mark of the third quarter, freshman attacker Will Jennings (Danvers, Mass.) scored a man-down goal off Harrison Cotter's (Lordship, Conn.) second assist of the game, and Jennings ended the day's scoring with a goal off a pass from Pinciaro with 1:56 remaining in regulation.

Hollenshade added his 30th of the season while Jones hit goals 44 and 45 in the fourth to maintain the league lead. Salve Regina's effort versus the nationally-ranked squad was a marked improvement over last season's 21-1 defeat in Beverly. The Seahawks travel to Wentworth on Tuesday in a battle for the fifth seed in the conference.

Hollenshade and Parks joined classmate Curtis McKeon (West Haven, Conn.) as three seniors honored prior to the game. McKeon went over the 200 mark in faceoffs won for the third time in four seasons with the Seahawk program.