Johns Hopkins put up an impressive effort against the defending champions.
CHAPEL HILL, N.C. â Dave Pietramala coached his 250th game at Johns Hopkins on Saturday. Not much for personal accolades, the 17th-year Blue Jay leader had to be pleased with the effort his entire team put forward in a 13-5 victory against third-ranked and defending national champion North Carolina. The win improves the Blue Jaysâ record to 4-0, while the Tar Heels slip to 3-1.
Eight different players scored goals for Johns Hopkins and 11 players dented the score sheet in all, but it was the play of Gerald Logan in goal and the Blue Jay defense that stood out. Logan posted a season-high 16 saves, including five in the first quarter and eight in the first half as Hopkins jumped to a 4-1 halftime lead. With the Tar Heels pressing in the second half, he added four saves in both the third and fourth quarters and the Blue Jay offense scored five straight goals in a span of less than five minutes in the fourth quarter to break the game open. Amazingly, Carolina never scored consecutive goals in the game.
No. 4 Johns Hopkins throttles No. 3 North Carolina, 13-5. #ncaaLAX
â NCAA Lacrosse (@NCAA_Lax) February 25, 2017
JHU - John Crawley: 4 goals pic.twitter.com/33dTWxX8rO
Hopkins scored the first two goals of the game in the opening five minutes â both strikes from in tight by senior Wilkins Dismuke â and answered each UNC goal in the first three quarters with a two-goal run to lead by scores of 4-1, 6-2 and eventually 8-3 entering the final period.
When North Carolinaâs Stephen Kelly scored right off the opening faceoff of the final period, the Blue Jays did themselves better than a two-goal spurt: They answered with the five-goal spree that turned the 8-4 lead into a 13-4 advantage with just under six minutes left in the game.
An extra-man goal by junior Patrick Fraser jump-started the deciding spree, which also included goals by senior Kieran Eissler and junior Joel Tinney and a pair of by senior John Crawley, who sandwiched his two goals around Tinneyâs 25-yard shot into an open net as Carolina went to the 10-man ride and Tinney made them pay with the long-range tally.
For all the talk about the Blue Jay offense thus far (Hopkins has scored at least 13 goals in each of its four games thus far), Saturdayâs win was about defense.
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Hopkinsâ starting defense of seniors Nick Fields and Trevor Koelsch and freshman Jack Rapine kept the Tar Heel attack away from Logan and he responded with his best showing of the early-season. North Carolinaâs starting attack and first midfield combined for three goals on 24 shots with Logan making 11 saves on the âHeels top group of six. Logan and the Blue Jays held UNC scoreless for more than 24 minutes between the first and third quarters and two other stretches of 11-plus minutes after halftime as well.
The Blue Jaysâ balanced scoring effort was led by Crawleyâs career-high-tying four-goal effort, while Tinney (2g, 2a) and Dismuke (2g) also added multi-goal games. Shack Stanwick (1g, 1a), Kyle Marr (2a) and Forry Smith (1g, 1a) also added multi-point games for Johns Hopkins, which was successful on 19-of-21 clearing attempts, connected on three of six extra-man attempts and scored on 13 of 39 shots.
Chris Cloutier scored twice for the Tar Heels, who didnât pick up an assisted goal on the day, but got a 14-of-21 effort from Kelly on faceoffs. Brian Balkam totaled eight saves in goal for North Carolina, but UNC scored on just one of 17 first-half shots and just 5-of-39 in the game.
