Lax takes down No. 15 Harvard

After struggling with its fourth-quarter performance all season, the Penn men’s lacrosse team was determined to fight to the finish against No. 15 Harvard in its last home game of the season. The 12-7 victory on Saturday gave the Quakers (5-7, 1-4 Ivy) their first league win of the season. But according to Murphy — who also recorded his first Ivy win as Penn’s head coach — that wasn’t what made the game special. “Justin Lynch, Joe Kelly, Tommy Dodge, Brendan Saxon, Rob McMullen, I was really happy for those guys,” he said. “Not only did we get a win for them in their last game here, but they actually played really well in their last home game too.” Murphy was thoroughly impressed with the team’s production up and down the lineup. “This is the first game where I really felt like we played the full 60 minutes and were pretty good in almost every phase,” he said. But the results weren’t there early, as Penn struggled to pull away from Harvard (5-5, 1-3) despite outshooting the Crimson 21-10 at the half. Thanks to three unassisted goals from Jason Duboe — the last of which came with just one second left in the second quarter, the game was tied 4-4 heading into the break. After stopping just one shot in the first 30 minutes, sophomore goalie Joe Hegener admitted he wasn’t pleased with his slow start. “We played good defense, I just didn’t play as well as I should have,” he said. “I wasn’t seeing it. So I went out early, got a bunch of shots, got yelled at by the coach, whatever I needed to do.” With a chuckle and a little sarcasm, he added, “And I went out there and saw the ball.” Hegener made six saves en route to blanking the Crimson in the third quarter. On the other end, John Conneely and Will Amling ignited a Penn run to start the second half, scoring 50 seconds apart and giving the Quakers a 6-4 lead. After that, the Crimson were constantly on their heels. Conneely netted another, Dan Savage scored going coast-to-coast in transition and Al Kohart whipped a shot inside the far post after a deft pass from Morgan Griff freed him on the left side. By the time Harvard could regain its bearings, the damage had been done. The Quakers would take a 9-4 lead into the fourth quarter. “At halftime we came in and coach [Wojcik] gave us a couple things to look for,” Kohart said. “He just said quicker movement, they were sliding pretty aggressive so it opened up a lot of backdoor cuts.” But in the end, the win was credited to the senior-laden defensive unit. “I did it for the players around me,” Hegener said. “Most of the defense are seniors, and this was their last home game.” After his four-goal performance, Kohart acknowledged that everyone, from the coaches down to Hegener, rallied behind the seniors. “We wanted to let them go out on Franklin Field with a W, and we were going to do anything in our will to get that done.”

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