The Colgate men’s lacrosse team traveled to Bethlehem, Pennsylvania this past weekend to take on the Lehigh Mountain Hawks. Despite the tough battle, the Raiders fell to the Mountain Hawks 7-10. The game started off with two Lehigh goals from junior attackman Mickey Fitzpatrick and junior attackman Tristan Rai. However, first-year attackman Mike Hawkins was able to put the Raiders on the board with just 15 seconds left in the first quarter. 

Colgate then scored the next three goals entering into the second quarter. Junior midfielder Duncan Hoskinson scored off a feed from junior midfielder Matt Donovan, and senior attackman Chase Wittich scored off a feed from sophomore midfielder Griffin Brown. Donovan then tallied an unassisted goal to pull the Raiders ahead 4-2 with 8:44 left in the second quarter. 

The Mountain Hawks answered back just a minute later as senior attackman John Mehok buried a shot following an assist from Rai. In response, Junior attackman Sam Cleveland put up another quick point for the Raiders. Lehigh tallied two more goals to bring the game to a 5-5 tie before the halftime break.

Lehigh’s Fitzpatrick scored the first goal of the second half with 12:25 left in the third quarter. Hawkins and Hoskinson each put up another goal, moving the score to 7-6 and once again pulling the Raiders into the lead. Despite the back and forth nature of the contest, Lehigh was able to snag the win by scoring the last four goals of the game. Lehigh’s Mehok netted the last goal in the third quarter, and the Mountain Hawks rallied in the fourth quarter to score three more goals.

First-year defender Charlie Messineo, junior midfielder Will Blumenberg and senior captain and faceoff player Collin Orr all tallied three ground balls for the Raiders, while Blumenberg also caused two turnovers. The Raiders turned the ball over 17 times during the contest, with six of those turnovers happening in the fourth quarter alone. 

Head Coach Mike Murphy reflected on the loss. “It came down to execution. They made the plays and we didn’t. If you look at the first handful of possessions, we turned the ball over. We were under ten turnovers in three of the first four games we played, and then today you get to seventeen. The first quarter was a lesson in what not to do offensively,” Murphy said.

The Raiders are now 3-2 overall and 0-2 in the Patriot League. Hawkins’ two goals place him among the nation’s leading scorers. 

“Unfortunately not the result we wanted, it was a tough loss. A lot of the mistakes we made on defense and offense are very fixable. We’re all keeping a positive mindset and looking forward to getting back after it again against Hobart and Boston University this coming week,” junior midfielder Danny Healey said.

“We played close with them for three quarters and lost all momentum when they took the first goal of the final quarter. After that, we lost composure and let the game slip away from us. They took advantage of our mistakes.” sophomore attackman Nicky Petkevich said.

This weekend, the Raiders will hit the road to take on the Boston University Terriers in another Patriot League contest. The game will begin at 1 p.m. on Saturday, March 10.

Contact Lexi Luthringer at lluthringer@colgate.edu.