Phillylacrosse.com, Posted 2/1/26
From Press Release
No. 7 Penn State men’s lacrosse prevailed in the opener to its 2026 campaign today, overcoming a first-half deficit to defeat Colgate, 18-14, in Holuba Hall.
Hunter Aquino (Academy of the New Church) set career-highs with 5 goals on 15 shots, leading an offensive core with 10 different goal scorers. The 2025 Big Ten Freshman of the Year added an assist to total six points and scooped two groundballs. Redshirt-senior Michael Faraone, after missing all of 2025 due to injury, recorded his first career hat trick.
Junior Kyle Lehman (Wissahickon) added three goals and two assists as well as two groundballs and a caused turnover to round out the hat trick recipients. Other goal scorers included freshman Jack Iannantuno, sophomore Chase Robertson, redshirt-freshman Andrew Beard, redshirt-senior Luke Walstrum (Council Rock North), junior Brendan Leary (Haverford School, 2 GB), senior Patrick Carragher, and junior Ryan DiRocco (Haverford School, 1 GB).
Reid Gills played the grit game for the Nittany Lions, leading Penn State with seven groundballs, while fellow faceoff Colby Baldwin added six more and caused one of the Blue & White’s 11 forced turnovers. The two also combined to win 24 out of 35 faceoffs. Redshirt-freshman Hayes Schreiner (Springside Chestnut Hill Academy) picked up the win in relief, recording four saves.
Also for the Nittany Lions, Lucca Dibartolomeo (Malvern Prep) had four groundballs and a caused turnover, Ryan O’Connor (Springfield-Delco) had an assist and two caused turnovers, Will Costin (Haverford School) had a groundball and Patrick Keenan (Malvern Prep) contributed a groundball.
Air Force 13, Lafayette 12
Caelan Driggs (Salesianum School) tallied three goals to help Air Force take the home opener.
Sophomore attackers Benjamin DiBattista and Nicholas Blalock (Hill School) were the Leopards’ standouts. DiBattista notched three goals, while Blalock finished with two goals and two assists. Aidan Kopen (Haverford School) added two goals and an assist.
Lafayette was first to strike in the contest (13:49), thanks to a goal by freshman midfielder Erik Volfson. The next 11 minutes of play was dominated by the hosts. Air Force put together a 4-0 run, which was eventually halted by DiBattista’s first goal of the day (1:32). Ben Heidt tallied another score for the Falcons late in the quarter and after the first period the Maroon and White trailed 5-2.
The hosts kept their foot on the gas in the second quarter, but Lafayette put four goals past Matt Deedy to keep it within striking distance. Caelan Driggs and Christian Schweiger both netted two goals in the frame for Air Force and senior captain Aidan Kopen notched two for the Leopards. It appeared the Falcons were going to head into halftime with a 10-5 lead, but Kopen found the back of the net with seven seconds left to reduce Lafayette’s deficit to 10-6.
Head coach Patrick Myers’ group owned the second half of play. After a scoreless first six minutes, seniors Nick Muller, Jack Irish (Malvern Prep) and DiBattista all scored within 1:15 of one another to make it a two-goal game (11-9) with 7:23 remaining in the stanza. Freshman attacker Charlie Foley also made his way onto the scoresheet for the first time in his career, but goals from Luke Vrsansky and Schweiger cushioned the hosts’ lead to 13-10 with 15 minutes to go.
