Dominant first half lifts Endicott to 18-10 win over Curry

BEVERLY, Mass. – The Endicott men's lacrosse team put up 16 goals in the first half of an 18-10 victory over Commonwealth Coast Conference (CCC) opponent Curry on Wednesday evening at Endicott Stadium as 10 different goal scorers found the back of the net against the Colonels. 

Endicott (6-3, 2-0 CCC) got five-point games out of sophomore attackers Scott McCormack (Norwalk, Conn.) and Nick Pinciaro (Beverly, Mass.) as well as multi-goal efforts from Connor McCormack (Norwalk, Conn.), Joshua Tordik (Sayville, N.Y.), and Mark Cornacchio (Westford, Mass.) as the Gulls converted 18 of their 32 shots on goal into scores. 

Five different Endicott goalkeepers manned the cage including freshman Cameron Bell (Falmouth, Maine) who earned the win, improving to 6-2 on the year.  Junior transfer Nick Triano (North Andover, Mass.) shined with six saves to lead all goalies while junior Kaleb Nichols (Sheldon, Vt.), sophomore Chris Fotta (Duxbury, Mass.), and freshman Max Rennillo (Shaker Heights, Ohio) all saw time between the pipes in the third and fourth quarters.

Curry (6-2, 0-1 CCC) picked up their first loss of conference play despite a four-goal game by junior midfielder Connor Arnold (Clifton Park, N.Y.) and four points apiece for leading point-getter John Castellano (Scarsdale, N.Y.) as well as senior midfielder Joseph Natale (Haverhill, Mass.). 

Endicott will be back in action on Tuesday, April 2^nd when they visit league opponent Wentworth for a 7:00 pm start.  Curry travels up to Husson this Saturday with the opening face-off set for 1:00 pm. 

The Blue and Green raced out to a 5-0 lead in the first seven minutes of the game before Curry was able to get on the scoreboard.  Another four goal stretch by Endicott pushed the lead up to 9-1 the Colonels scored again to make the score 9-2 at the end of the first.  The Gulls would score seven of the eight second quarter goal including freshman midfielder Peter Field's (Hampstead, N.H.) first goal of the season with 4:41 remaining in the half.  Field would later add an assist in the fourth quarter. 

In the second half, Curry outscored Endicott 7-2 but faced an uphill battle down 16-3 at halftime.  Arnold scored all four of his goals in the second half, two of which were assisted by Castellano.  For Endicott, Cornacchio tallied two of his three points of the night on an unassisted tally at the 9:43 mark of the third and another one at 11:01 in the fourth. 

Defensively, Curry's senior defenseman Marc Fein (East Greenbush, N.Y.) forced five Endicott turnovers while Endicott witnessed 11 different players caused a Colonels miscue. 

Gulls face-off specialist graduate student Sam Ozycz (Cheshire, Conn.) was efficient, winning 22-of-27 attempts on the draw with 17 groundballs.  Ozycz's dominance on face-offs was a major factor in his team's first half offensive output.  In relief of Ozycz, freshman defenseman Erik Mangrum (Haverhill, Mass.) won 3-of-5 attempts as Endicott overall won 78.1% of their face-offs. 

Endicott controlled 51 groundballs to just 27 for Curry, outshot Curry 50-32, and went 2-for-4 on man-up opportunities.  Curry struggled by going 17-of-30 on clear attempts and 0-for-3 with the extra-man advantage.