The men’s lacrosse team brought home a huge win on Saturday, Feb. 25, when they defeated the No. 17 Haverford College Rams by a score of 9-3 at Edith Robb Dixon Field. The victory was the team’s first win over Haverford since February 2009.
Head coach Steve Colfer and his team scouted Haverford and watched videos to prepare for their season-opening matchup.
“We have our kids learn the system and teach them how to defend it and how to attack it offensively,” Colfer said.
The team had a lot of key players perform well throughout the game. Senior attack Brian Hill led the team with three goals on eight shots and junior attack Bobby Thorp picked up four points by scoring a goal and adding three assists.
Freshman midfielder Anthony DiNenno won 10 of his 14 faceoffs and controlled most of the ground balls for Cabrini. The Cavs had 25 groundballs while Haverford had 21.
“Coming into the game, we knew Haverford had a very good goalie and an aggressive defense,” DiNenno said. “Me being a faceoff guy, I knew the only way we were going to get goals or the opportunities we wanted on Haverford was to get as many possessions for my team as possible.”
The Cavs obtained the first couple of points within six minutes of the game thanks to senior midfielder Joe Arrell, sophomore attack Matt Biegel and freshman midfielder Julius Mouser. Mouser’s goal was the first of his collegiate career.
Thorp helped the team’s offense in the second quarter with a goal and, after the Fords scored, freshman attack Mike Leyden scored to help Cabrini enter halftime with a 5-1 lead.
“From the opening faceoff to the end of the game, I felt that our defense was also aggressive towards their offense and forced many turnovers,” DiNenno said. “Our offense controlled the ball and was poised about the shots we took and I feel that really made a difference in the game.”
Cabrini benefited from their lead in the third quarter when Leyden scored with just over two minutes, pushing the score to 7-1. Arrell scored his first goal of the season in the fourth quarter and Hill’s final goal helped Cabrini pick up their first win of the season.
After only allowing three goals in their season-opener, Colfer was very pleased with the team’s defense.
“I thought our defense played extremely well and thought we were in control of the game for the most part,” Colfer said. “I thought there were areas of improvement. Our offense needed to be more crisp and we needed to clear the ball a little bit better. But I think these are two areas we are all working on in practice.”
Goalkeeper Erick Zarzecki made 12 saves in the win.
“Going into the game against our local rival Haverford, we knew that it was going to be a highly-anticipated game with two great defenses,” Zarzecki said. “Our defense did a fantastic job as a whole in allowing them only to score three goals.”
Zarzecki is proud of his teammates for pulling of a fantastic win.
“We controlled the game for the most part in getting out to an early lead then our defense held them down well,” Zarzecki said. “My defense did a great job in giving me shots that I could see well so that I could make most of the saves.”
Overall, Colfer was highly satisfied with how the team played.
“I thought the effort was good,” Colfer said. “To get the first game there’s a lot of anxiety, a lot of unknown. I thought we handled that very well, so I was genuinely pleased with their effort and clearly the result.”
