Syracuse Men's Lax Crush Scarlet Knights

The Syracuse University Men's Lacrosse team easily defeated the Scarlet Knights of Rutgers today at the Warrior Lacrosse Classic in East Hartford, Connecticut with a 12-2 victory. Recent Johns Hopkins transfer Tommy Palasek had a career high six points and sophomore JoJo Marasco finished the day with four.

Rutgers jumped out to an early lead with an unassisted goal from Will Mangan just four minutes into the first quarter. After that goal, the Orange went on to score 11 straight including goals from the likes of Jovan Miller, and Collin Donahue, recent Rutgers transfer.

A strong point for Syracuse in todays game was the defensive performance.

"The defense, once again, was extremely stingy and did a good job, understood the game plan and their match-ups against Rutgers," Syracuse Coach John Desko said in the post game press conference.

Syracuse outshot Rutgers by a wide 35-16 margin and cleared on 18 out of 19 attempts, however the Scarlet Knights won 12 out of the 18 face-offs. The face-off troubles for the Orange were due in part to Chris Mattes of Rutgers, the best face off man in the country, winning 68% of his face-offs this season.

The Orange have won three straight and look to carry this momentum into a marquee match-up with the top-ranked team in the country, Notre Dame, this Saturday in the Carrier Dome.