Phillylacrosse.com, Posted 4/9/23
From Press Release
Max Semple fired a shot in the top corner from the right wing two minutes into overtime as the host Dragons defeated Stony Brook 15-14 Saturday. The Dragons won for the fifth straight time and improved to 7-3 overall and 4-0 in the Colonial Athletic Association. Drexel remains tied for the top spot in the CAA and is now 4-0 in conference play for the first time since 2007.
Semple scored on the Dragons’ second possession of the extra period. Drexel started overtime with the ball and a man-up for 23 seconds but could not score. Stony Brook then had its chance but the Drexel defense came up with a blocked shot. Pat Udovich (Archmere Academy, 2GB, 1CT) then grabbed a key ground ball and the Dragons were able to clear. Less than a minute later, Jack Joyner (Academy of the New Church, 2A) set up Semple to give the Dragons their second overtime win of the year.
The game went back and forth all day as neither team led by more than two goals on the afternoon. It was tied on 11 occasions. There were 11 ties in the game. Stony Brook scored two goals in less than a minute to take a 13-12 lead with 11:07 to play. They held that lead until the 4:18 mark before Luke Tomak scored an unassisted goal to tie it. The Dragons got the ball right back and less than a minute later Sean Curcio (Manheim Township, 1G, 1A) found Sean Donnelly for his fifth score of the game.
Stony Brook responded after a Drexel timeout and tied it once again. Dylan Pallonetti came out of the timeout, beat his defender and rifled a shot into the top corner, making it 14-14. Drexel won the face-off but turned it over giving the Seawolves a chance to take the lead. However, Udovich caused a Will Button turnover with less than 30 seconds to play and grabbed the ground ball. Drexel got it into the offensive end and the Seawolves committed a late penalty before the end of regulation.
Drexel had a balanced day on the offensive end with eight players scoring at least one goal and 13 having at least one point. Donnelly led the way with five goals and six points. Semple had a pair of goals and two assists. He fed Charlie Maly from behind the net on the run as time expired in the first half. Maly was able to quick stick it home before the horn to tied the game at 4-4. Tomak and Zach Augustine (Avon Grove) also scored twice, while Jack Mulcahy (Downingtown East) had two assists and three points.
Also, defenseman Collin Gucwa (Bishop Shanahan) had three groundballs and Luke Carden (Malvern Prep) had an assist, two caused turnovers and a groundball and Ben Scandone (Allentown Central Catholic) had an assist.
Jonathan Huber led the Seawolves with five goals. He had three straight goals in the third quarter as Stony Brook took a two-goal lead at 11-9. Pallonetti added a pair and three assists. Matt Anderson also recorded a hat trick for the Seawolves, who had their four-game winning streak snapped.
The Dragons won 20 of 31 face-offs, all by Justin Joseph (Wyoming Area, PA), who also had 12 groundballs. He recorded a game-high 12 ground balls. Drexel wasn’t able to capitalize on the face-off advantage as much as it would like, as the Dragons committed 21 turnovers. Stony Brook’s Christian Loud caused five of those. The Seawolves outshot the Dragons by a 57-35 margin. Pallonetti had 18 of those shots. Ross Blumenthal made 11 saves for DU, while Jamison MacLachlan turned aside six for the visitors.