The No. 3 Genesee Community College men's lacrosse team trailed twice in its National Junior College Athletic Association Men's Lacrosse Championship Tournament semifinal game.
The first time they were able to overcome the deficit, but the second time they came as close as they could before running out of time and falling by a single goal to No. 2 Nassau Community College 15-14 May 12 at Charles R. Wilber Field on the campus of Onondaga Community College in Syracuse.
The back-and-forth affair saw the Lions jump out to an early lead 14 seconds into the contest, but the Cougars came back with authority by scoring seven of the game's next eight goals in getting their biggest lead of the game with a five-goal margin at 7-2 with less than six minutes to go in the first half.
The Lions turned the game in the final 12 minutes of the third quarter by scoring a half-dozen goals and re-taking the lead at the end of three quarters at 11-9. The third quarter was also the only quarter where Genesee didn't win a majority of the faceoffs.
Genesee fought back and after being down four goals with nearly nine minutes left at 14-10, they scored four of the game's last five goals with the last coming with 34 seconds remaining before the Cougars ran out of time.
Statistics heavily favored the Cougars as it appeared they deserved a better fate.
Genesee out-scored Nassau in three of the four quarters and out-shot the Lions 44-37 overall and 25-22 with shots on net. Overall the Cougars took two-thirds of all the faceoffs with 22 wins and also won the groundball game at 33-29. The Cougars killed five man-up opportunities, while Nassau killed just one Cougar odd-man advantage.
But perhaps the most telling statistic that heavily favored Genesee was its time with the lead. The Cougars had the lead for more than half the contest at 31:28, while the Lions led for 19:41 with the teams tied for the other 8:51.
Six players accounted for all the offensive production for Genesee. From a point-perspective, Evan Hollfelder had a team-high six points. Jason Chiodo had a five-point outing with four points coming each from Jordan Brennan, Kevin McParlene, and Alex Mack. Rounding out the scoring was Patrick Bilbrey with three points.
Goal-wise Chiodo and McParlene each scored three, while a pair came each from Hollfelder, Bilbrey, Mack and Brennan. Chiodo and Mack both registered a team-high five shots on net.
Hollfelder had a team-high four helpers, with a pair each coming from Chiodo, Mack, and Brennan. McParlene and Bilbrey added an assist each.
Garrett Lazore had seven saves in the cage, while the production rate for man-up goals and faceoffs both being at 66 percent.
Andrew Forte had a team-high 21 faceoff wins, as well as a team-high 12 groundballs. Bilbrey had seven groundballs with four coming from Chiodo. Mack added three and Zach Wade had a pair to round out multiple groundball getters.
Hoya'daiwat John had a team-high three caused turnovers to go with a groundball.
Genesee completes its 2018 season at 12-3 and with a seventh final four appearance in the last eight years.
