ALFRED, NY – The Alfred University men's lacrosse team was upset by the College at Brockport on Tuesday afternoon in Yunevich Stadium. The Saxons (8-4, 4-1 Empire 8) took a commanding 3-0 lead in the first quarter but the Golden Eagles stayed within reach and ended up pulling out the win by a score of 9-8.

Frank Gavigan (Yorktown, NY/Yorktown) put the Saxons on the board early with a man-down goal around the 11 minute mark of the first quarter.

Not even a minute later, Patrick Brewer (Bath, NY/Haverling) made it a 2-0 game on an unassisted goal followed by a goal from Anthony Ricottilli (Cortland, NY/Cortland) to give AU the 3-0 advantage, which is where it stayed for the remainder of the first quarter.

Brockport came to life early in the second period when Lars Roos put the Golden Eagles on the board just 18 seconds in, making it 3-1.

Brockport scored again at the 13:34 mark to bring it to a one goal game then evened the score at three all with a Billy Coppola goal just under the eight minute mark.

Play became stagnant for most of the remaining minutes of the second quarter until Jack Chapman (Elmira, NY/Notre Dame) fed Noah Soriano (Valley Cottage, NY/Nyack) a perfect pass for a goal with just 10 seconds on the clock, which sent the Saxons into the halftime break with the 4-3 advantage.

Alfred converted a man-up goal from Cale Donegan (Corning, NY/Corning-Painted Post) early in the third quarter to make it a 5-3 game.

Brockport responded minutes later to make it 5-4 then scored again at just under the three minute mark of the third quarter to tie the game at 5.

As the teams entered the fourth quarter all knotted up, Donegan wasted no time in putting the Saxons ahead just 46 seconds into the final period. The Golden Eagles though, had the answer and scored two straight to grab their first lead of the game at 7-6.

Donegan attempted to take over for AU by himself and scored his third goal of the game to tie it at seven with 10:31 remaining in the game.

Unfortunately for the Saxons, Brockport had its best stuff today and scored two in a row late in the game to put AU in a two score hole with just seven minutes to play.

The Saxons had trouble getting to the net in those final seven minutes and were only able to get within one goal on their way to the 9-8 non-conference loss.

Donegan led the Saxon offense on the day with a hat-trick and five ground balls. Ricottilli finished with a goal and an assist. Chapman had two assists on the afternoon while Gavigan, Soriano, Brewer and Joe Fornataro (Rochester, NY/Greece Athena) all scored one goal.

Shane Weber (Hull, MA/Hull) assisted on one goal and caused six turnovers, including a timely steal away from the Brockport offense with just minutes to play to give Alfred a final opportunity to tie the game, but to no avail.

Gage Ponsetti (Penn Yan, NY/Penn Yan) got the start in the net and played all 60 minutes. Ponsetti finished with 11 saves on the day.

The Saxons will get back into Empire 8 play this Saturday as they travel to Oneonta, New York to take on the Hartwick Hawks at 1PM.