After seeing a successful postseason culminate in a disappointing semifinals loss in the America East tournament last season, the Binghamton men’s lacrosse team is seeking redemption.
BU will have to do that without two of its top-three leading scorers, however. Attack Matt Springer and midfielder Michael Antinozzi, who combined for 62 of BU’s 143 goals in 2014, were lost to graduation. In total, the Bearcats will bring back 15 upperclassmen, who will work on building up the winning culture surrounding last season.
“I think that when guys get new jobs, they all talk about changing the culture,” BU head coach Scott Nelson said. “What they’re trying to get at is what we have here right now.”
A top returner will be senior attack Tucker Nelson, who led BU in assists last season with 28. Linemate Paul O’Donnell will also return to the box after a 2014 campaign that saw him earn 19 goals and 10 assists.
“We’re going to be a different team this year, I think just as good,” Nelson said. “We might be a little more athletic, we’re bigger on the defensive side … guys are going to fill roles.”
Filling roles is especially crucial in BU’s backline, which graduated defenders Shawn Needham, Greg Cove and Garret Augustyn. Combined, the trio accounted for 53 caused turnovers and 81 ground balls last season to keep Binghamton’s average goals-against clip at 10.6 per game. Stepping up this season as the anchor of the young defense will be junior Chris Bechle.
“It’s been nice as a junior to kind of step in that leadership role and see how those freshmen are reacting, and I think it’s been great,” Bechle said.
That’s not to say Bechle won’t have any veterans to look to by the BU crease. Junior long-stick midfielder George Deignan is set to come back this season after 13 appearances in 2014. In net, sophomore Tanner Cosens is projected to take the start. But for BU to see the same success this season as it did with last year’s squad, Tucker Nelson knows that all three sides of the field will have to play — and grow — together.
“It really comes down to how you play on the field,” he said. “Obviously winning the conference is the ultimate goal, but if we get better game by game, we will win the conference.”
Among the top freshmen listed for this year’s team are defenders Salvatore Fama and Eric Schweitzer, midfielders Ben Kocis and Joe Grossi, and attacks Thomas McAndrew and Stephen Petrelli. Now in his fourth year at the helm of the men’s lacrosse program, Scott Nelson is hopeful about how this year’s incoming class will mesh.
“We’ve been able to recruit more balance on our team,” Nelson said. “When I first got here, we had some really good players, but we didn’t have a lot of depth. We’ve been able to change that and bring in a lot of pretty good kids.”
But with 14 freshmen, growing pains can be inevitable.
“I think we’ve got some ability … but when we had our scrimmages, every time I looked up it seemed like a freshman was in a certain spot,” Nelson said. “So we’ve got a ways to go to build off of that.”
BU was set to begin its season against Northeast Conference foe Sacred Heart on Saturday, but the game was postponed due to inclement weather. That leaves the team’s Feb. 21 game against Marist to inaugurate a non-conference schedule that will have the Bearcats meet with perennial powerhouses Cornell and Towson — the current talk of college lacrosse after knocking off fifth-ranked Johns Hopkins on Tuesday.
For Bechle, first face-off can’t come soon enough.
“We want to make a statement right off the bat,” Bechle said. “We want people to know what we’re all about, and that’s what we’ve been practicing these past couple weeks.”
Face-off against Marist is set for noon on Saturday, Feb. 21 at the Bearcats Sports Complex.
-Article updated on Feb. 13 to reflect postponement of the Sacred Heart game originally scheduled for Feb. 14.