UTICA, N.Y. - The SUNY Poly men's lacrosse team will host SUNY Delhi on Thursday night in the North Atlantic Conference (NAC) Semifinal Game. The Wildcats had a great regular season, going 10-4 with a 7-1 record in NAC play. The 7-1 record earned them the #2 seed in the NAC Tournament, allowing them to host the first round of the tournament. The #1 seed in the tournament is Maine Maritime who earned the top spot with a perfect 8-0 record in conference play. SUNY Delhi is the #3 and Husson is the #4.
The Wildcats will open up the tournament with a familiar foe, SUNY Delhi. The Broncos went 7-8 this season with a 6-2 record in conference play. The two games that they lost were to #1 Maine Maritime (12-11) and #2 SUNY Poly (9-5). The Broncos were led this season by a group of five players who all recorded between 22 and 27 points this year. Logan Baur was the team leader with 27 points (13g 14a). Jagger Beachak (15g / 7a) and Brandon McGrath (17g / 9a) each had 26 points for their team. Jack McClurg and Sam Bieber had 23 and 22 points respectively. Goalkeeper Samuel Steng started all 15 games for the Broncos this year. He had a save percentage of 49.6% with 132 goals against and 130 saves.
SUNY Poly's top four scorers all had over 37 points this season. Andrew Maycock was the team leader with 45 points on 22 goals and 23 assists. Lyle Beeman scored 26 goals and dished out 16 assists. Luke Taylor had a team-high 28 goals and 11 assists. Payton Thomas scored 26 goals and dished 11 assists. Joshua Cargen and Steven Sullivan have anchored the Wildcat defense all season. Cargen has a team-high 29 caused turnovers and a team-high 65 ground balls as a midfielder. Sullivan has 19 CTs with 35 groundballs as a defender. Joseph VanZandt has been great in goal all season for Poly. He has a record of 9-4 with 119 saves and and 73 goals allowed.
The two faceoff men, Dillon May for the Wildcats and Anthony Ferrato look to be very evenly matched on paper. It will be one of the matchups to watch in the game. May has won 137 of 240 this season while Ferrato has won 138 of 237. In their last matchup, Ferrato and May were perfectly split 50-50, each winning nine of 18.
As a team, the Wildcats averaged 12.14 goals per game this season while Delhi averaged 10.87 goals per game.
The NAC Semifinal game will take place at SUNY Poly's Wildcat Field on Thursday, May 4th at 7:00 PM. The game will be streamed live on the SUNY Poly Sports Network (SPSN).