ST. PAUL, Minn. – When the Midwest Lacrosse Conference schedule was released, the University of Northwestern Men's Lacrosse team knew the start of conference play would be about as tough of a test as you could imagine. After opening up with a 16-6 loss at last year's runner-up, Dubuque, Northwestern hosted reigning champion Lake Forest College on Saturday at a sunny Reynolds Field. The Foresters proved why they still hold the crown as they used a methodical scoring approach across the four quarters and physical play on defense to win 15-2 over UNW.
As mentioned previously, the goal distribution was almost perfectly even across the four quarters for LFC. The Foresters led 4-0 after one and 8-0 at half. The third quarter saw a total of four goals scored, but only three were by the visitors.
Austin Lemke (Inver Grove Heights, Minn./Saint Croix Lutheran Academy) got Northwestern on the board with the first goal of the second half at the 10:43 mark before Lake Forest closed the quarter with three of its own to make the score 11-1 heading into the final period.
Much like the previous quarter, UNW also scored the opening goal of the fourth when
Alex Petersen (Prior Lake, Minn./Prior Lake) rattled the cage for his first goal of the 2024 season. Unfortunately for the Eagles, LFC would go on to score four more times before the final buzzer, resulting in a 15-2 win for the visitors. The Foresters scored four goals in the first, second and fourth quarters and three in the third, showing incredible consistency.
Lemke and Petersen's goals were the highlights offensively for Northwestern, who fell to 3-5 overall and 0-2 in the MLC with the loss.
Ryan Adkins (St. Michael, Minn./St. Michael-Albertville) was once again stellar facing off, winning 14 of 19 opportunities and scooping up 10 ground balls.
Jakob Montesi (Evergreen, Colo./Evergreen) followed suit with five ground balls and
Robert McHenry (Crystal, Minn./Robbinsdale Armstrong) four, in addition to his seven saves in cage.
Christian Mitchell (Oak Grove, Minn./PACT Charter School) added three ground balls.
Joseph Kalski (Oak Creek, Wis./Oak Creek) and
Sam Moses (Wausau, Wis./Wausau East) each caused two turnovers apiece.
The Eagles will continue MLC play on Saturday, April 13
th when they travel to Cornell College. Faceoff in Mount Vernon is scheduled for 1:00 PM.
