M. Lacrosse tastes Ivy victory after drought

After defeating Cornell on March 30, 1994, the Penn men's lacrosse went on a three-year, 17 game conference winless streak, which ended on March 29, 1997 with an 11-7 win over the Big Red in Ithaca, N.Y. The resurrection of the men's lacrosse program has begun. On Saturday, the Quakers ended a span of 17 straight Ivy losses and won their first league game in three years with an 11-7 victory over Cornell. The Quakers (4-3, 1-1 Ivy League) used a dominating first half effort to throw the Big Red (2-5, 1-1) out of its traditionally slow-paced offensive rhythm. Forced to play catch-up, Cornell fell further behind, as the Quakers pounded out eight straight goals to amass a lead that no fateful losing streak could stop. "It was important for us to come out fired up," Penn co-captain John Ward said. "We really jumped all over them. It felt good. There was relief and excitement after the final horn had sounded." Leading 2-1, Penn scored a staggering six times within five minutes to break the game open. After the Quakers scored two of the six in the final minutes of the first quarter, Quakers freshman Peter Janney took control of the start of the second quarter by scoring three goals within one minute, 49 seconds. Pete scored another goal 30 seconds later, but this time it was Quaker Pete McGill who found the back of the net to give Penn an 8-1 lead. "We had a burst of energy and wanted to put the game out of reach," Janney said. "The other guys found me and I got the looks. I don't think they expected us to come out so fired up." After watching the barrage of Quaker goals, 29-year Cornell coach Richie Moran decided that his starting goalie, Rich Yost, had served as a wicket long enough and replaced him with Greg Zorella who helped settle his team and recorded a respectable 15 saves over the final 43 minutes. Up 8-1 at halftime, Penn reminded themselves to stay in control and not give Cornell an opportunity to get back into the game. Last year, the Quakers squandered a 7-1 halftime lead against Cornell en route to a 12-11 overtime loss. "That we were up 7-1 last year was in the back of everyone's minds," John Ward said. "We didn't want to change what we had been doing because we were getting goals out of the normal flow of our offense." The team that decided to change its approach in the start of the second half was Cornell which decided that they were tired of being scored on at even strength and chose to give the Quakers goals off of extra man opportunities. A Big Red holding penalty at 4:35 of the third and a slash at 8:45 led to two Jeff Zuckerman goals and a 10-1 Quakers lead. Cornell did make its expected comeback in the third quarter, but their run of four goals only served as a band-aid on what had become a fatal flesh wound. Ward picked up his second goal of the game for the Quakers 3:32 into the fourth to end Cornell's fantasy of a comeback. Two more Big Red goals in the final minute improved its final statistics, but not its win-loss record. The victory doesn't clinch an NCAA tournament berth or vault Penn into the national rankings, but it is a big step mentally for the team as they head into their remaining four Ivy contests. "The win was something we needed," Ward said. "There have been games where we've been the better team and haven't shown it on the field. We are ready to go again next weekend." The significance of the win wasn't lost on Quakers coach Marc Van Arsdale, but he would rather count it as a single game rather than the culmination of a crusade. The first year coach's commitment is to the present season and his current players and not to rectify the struggles of years past. "It's a special one for the seniors to go up to a place like that with their tradition in lacrosse and get one on the road. I haven't really made any big deal about this streak that's been going on. This is one group and one season and we are 1-1 in the league now." Senior co-captain Jon Cusson led the Quakers with two goals and four assists. Ward credited Cusson with being the catalyst in their second quarter spurt, saying that the Cornell defense could not handle his ability to distribute the ball around the offense. Matt Schroeder, who has established himself as the Quakers number one goalie after sharing time with Shane Lavery to start the season, recorded 23 saves in goal for Penn including 10 in the third quarter. Next week is another league game against Dartmouth with the result counting the same as the Cornell game, but for first time in a while no player will enter the game with questions about the past and the weight of a losing streak tying them down. Given up for dead, men's lacrosse has been reborn.

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