Air Force Academy
Delaware
Air Force Lacrosse Falls to Delaware, 7-6
3/20/2004 12:00:00 AM | Men's Lacrosse
March 20, 2004
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NEWARK, DE -- The No. 18 ranked Air Force men's lacrosse team suffered its third consecutive one-goal loss on Saturday, falling on the road to Delaware 7-6 in non-conference action. The Falcons drop to 2-3 overall, after opening the season with two wins. Delaware improves to 6-2 overall.
The Falcons led by two goals late in the game, but Delaware fought back. Blue Hen Ryan Metzbower scored two goals in the final quarter, including the game-winning extra man goal with 9:35 left to play, as Delaware notched the upset.
"I am disappointed in the loss," head coach Fred Acee said. "We played well enough to win, but didn't get the job done."
Air Force, which got two goals each from Greg Dangler and Justin Kuchta and a goal and two assists from William Meister, fell to 2-3 with its third straight one-goal loss. The Falcons were coming off setbacks of 11-10 vs. Army and 10-9 vs. North Carolina.
Delaware, which downed Air Force in the first meeting between the schools since 1980, held a 33-23 advantage in shots and a 28-16 margin in groundballs. Delaware goalkeeper Chris Collins posted seven saves while Air Force netminder Jeff Moss recorded 13 stops in his first action of the season in place of regular starter Justin Pavoni, who was hurt in warm ups.
Metzbower, who had scored just five goals in his first seven games this season, came up big in the final quarter to lead the Hens to the victory. Both of his fourth quarter goals were almost identical as he took a feed from Matt Alrich and rifled a shot past Moss from 20 yards out to tie the game with 13:33 left to play and recorded the game winner with 9:35 left off a feed from Hipple.
Air Force had several chances to tie the game up but turned the ball over on four straight possessions and had two shots go wide in the final 10 seconds.
The teams traded goals twice in the first quarter before Dangler scored with 48 seconds left in the first quarter to give the Falcons a 3-2 lead and Kuchta scored just 52 seconds into the second stanza for a 4-2 cushion. But the Hens came back to send the game into intermission tied at 4-4 as Hall scored his second goal of the game unassisted with 4:21 left in the second quarter and Trentzsch scored off a Hipple feed just 1:17 before halftime.
Kuchta and Dangler struck again for Air Force as each scored a goal in the opening 1:21 of the second half to give the Falcons a 6-4 lead. But the Hens shut down Air Force the rest of the way. Cam Howard started the comeback with an unassisted goal with 3:36 left in the third quarter, cutting the lead to 6-5 and setting up Metzbower's fourth quarter goals.
The Falcons defense did a excellent job on Alrich, who entered the game as the nation's No. 19 leading scorer with 17 goals. They held Alrich without a goal, snapping his streak of 22 straight games with at least one goal scored.
Air Force will have three days to prepare for Stony Brook. The teams clash on Wednesday (March 24) at Stony Brook.
