The No. 7 Virginia men’s lacrosse team followed up their season opening win over No. 9 Loyola University Maryland with a thrilling 18-14 win over Drexel in their home opener at Klöckner Stadium.
In front of a packed crowd on a warm day, it was junior attackman Mike D’Amario who stole the show, lighting up the scoreboard by scoring seven goals to lead the way for Virginia (2-0, 0-0 ACC).
Coach Lars Tiffany had high praise for D’Amario and his ability to remain confident even when things aren’t going well.
“That man steps on the field and he wants to shoot the ball every time he touches it,” Tiffany said. “He reminds [me] of some of those guys that are like ‘Hey, if I’m a 35 percent shooter and I miss my first 10 — then you better watch out because I’m a 35 percent shooter and I’m going to get to my ratio.’ He just has that instinct.”
He added D’Amario was able to provide a lift for the offense when some of the other attackmen were struggling.
“He is a natural born scorer,” Tiffany said. “We needed him to step up.”
Virginia got off to a strong start against Drexel (0-1, 0-0 CAA), grabbing an 8-3 lead before Drexel closed the gap towards the end of the second quarter. The Cavaliers headed into halftime with a slim 9-8 lead.
The game would have a similar up-and-down rhythm in the second half, with the Cavaliers coming out of halftime on fire, taking a 13-8 lead. However, Drexel closed the gap with a 5-1 run to make the score 14-13 in Virginia’s favor.
Virginia was able to bounce back once again, scoring four additional goals to Drexel’s one, finally taking the lead for good and securing the 18-14 victory. Despite the win and great start to the season thus far, Tiffany said there were a lot of things Virginia could have done better.
“We found 14 mistakes [last week] that we did again,” Tiffany said.
He added that Virginia cannot put too much weight on the wins, because there is still a lot of work to be done.
“Fourteen philosophical things we need to change on the offense and defense ends after the first game [at Loyola],” Tiffany said. “I give Drexel credit for taking advantage and taking them up the field today, but we have a lot of work to do here. We have to get better in transition defense for sure.”
Virginia will now look to continue the momentum built in this young season, as the team has a quick turnaround before hosting Siena Tuesday night at 6 p.m.
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