The Genesee Community College men's lacrosse team learned who their region and district opponent will be yesterday after Monroe Community College held on to beat Mercyhurst North East, 9-5 April 25.
The Cougars will now face the Tribunes in Syracuse, April 28 with a 1:30 p.m. start time for a chance to return to the men's lacrosse junior college national championship also to be held in Syracuse at Lazer Stadium May 12-13.
The championship game will be live-streamed from Syracuse via Onondaga Community College's athletics online channel found at the following link: https://bit.ly/2pEIT9N
The Cougars were in the national spotlight April 25 with the National Junior College Athletic Association naming Cougar Jordan Brennan as its national men's lacrosse player of the week. The honor for Brennan came just one day after being named the NJCAA Region-III Male Athlete of the Week, April 24.
Brennan became the second Genesee player to earn national player honors after Andrew Forte captured the honor earlier in the season. The two national player weekly recognitions for Genesee are currently the most by any men's lacrosse team nationally.
In their only meeting of the season, Genesee beat Monroe 15-10 in the Cougars' opening game of the season in Rochester. The Tribunes had leads of 3-1 and 4-2 before Genesee rallied for the win. The Cougars out-shot Monroe by a more than 2-1 margin at 49-24.
On the overall season, Genesee averages nearly 20 goals-per-game, while Monroe is just over 16 goals-per-game. Although the Cougars average more shots-per-game at 54-43, the Tribunes score at a higher-average-percentage at 38-36.
The goalies with the most minutes played this season are Garrett Lazore from Genesee and Mark Campbell from Monroe. The latter holds the edge in goals-against average at 5.73-to-6.24 and also save percentage at 67-54 percent.
Up front, the Cougars are led by Jordan Brennan and Kevin McParlene, who both have 59 points; Jason Chiodo in goals with 40; and Brennan in assists with 28.
Monroe's Nick Kallio is the Tribunes' team leader in points (75), goals (35) and assists (40). Chiodo has a team-high 97 shots, while Monroe's Jared George leads the Tribunes with 79.
The top groundball getters for each team include Forte (129) for Genesee and Adam Witscheber (51) for Monroe, while the faceoff leaders are Reed Perestam (80) for Monroe and Forte (155) for Genesee.
