Defense dominates as Whittier cruises by MIT
Photo by: Bill McCarroll/Friends of Whittier Lacrosse
WHITTIER, Calif. – The Whittier College men’s lacrosse team wrapped up its final home game of its eight-game stand to open the season with an emphatic 17-1 win over the Massachusetts Institute of Technology on Tuesday afternoon at Memorial Stadium.
The Poets’ (5-3) defense dominated limiting MIT to just 17-of-35 clears and forcing the Engineers into 38 turnovers. Of those MIT miscues, the purple and gold caused 21.
Riley Myrick led the defensive effort with a game-high five caused turnovers and a team-high five ground balls. The defenseman also took two shots and cashed in on his first scoring strike of the season at 3:19 of the second quarter.
His second quarter goal capped a 7-0 stanza for WC and gave the Poets a 12-1 lead at the break.
Whittier played three in the cage but it was Robert Bazlen who earned his fifth win of the season. He made just two saves in 30 minutes of action. Jon Cairone picked up 21:52 in net for WC and stopped three shots while Wiles Larimer played the final 6:27 in goal.
Corey Schab won an impressive 10-of-14 faceoffs for the purple and gold and had his hand in four caused turnovers. He tied Myrick for the team lead in ground balls.
Offensively the Poets had nine different goal scorers and had a trio of players score three goals. Charles Fisher, Daniel McQuade and Colt Adams all recorded hat tricks while Fisher and McQuade each handed out two assists.
Whittier’s ‘O’ scored in bunches which includes scores at the 11:00 and 10:50 marks of the second quarter and the 3:55, 3:31 and 3:19 marks of frame two. WC also added a scoring strike at 10:19 and 8:47 of the second.
It was Sean McCarroll who scored first for WC at 11:04 of the first quarter but Fisher who recorded the eventual game winner at 6:28.
The Poets outshot the Engineers 46-13, corralled 43 ground balls to MIT’s 31 and was good on 26-of-27 clears. Both teams went 0-3 on man-up situations.
Whittier returns to action on Saturday, April 3, as it hits the road for a three-game trip. WC’s first stop is at Sewanee at 5 pm.
