by Daniel Gruber
Hens finish out successful season with conference tournament loss
The University of Delaware Men’s lacrosse team’s season came to an end on Thursday night (5/2) dropping an 18-11 contest to the Towson Tigers in the CAA tournament semifinals.
“We battled all year and that didn’t stop tonight, unfortunately, we just didn’t play our best game, but this is something we’ll learn from and grow heading into the future for this program.” head coach Ben Deluca said
Offensively, the hens were lead by senior Joe Eisele who finishes his career with a 4 goal game, and 89 for his career. Junior Charlie Kitchen added two goals and two assists, while extending his scoring streak to 32 consecutive games.
Defensively, Junior goalkeeper Matt Deluca captured a 16 save performance, and this performance puts him at over 500 for his career and places him in the top 10 all time in school history.
The game started strong for the Blue Hens, limiting Towson to one goal in the first 20 minutes of the contest, while scoring three themselves.
The Tigers then responded well, adding three straight to make take the 4-3 lead. Blue Hens Charlie Kitchen and Jake Govett then answered back with consecutive goals, reclaiming the lead.
To finish the half, the tigers added 3 more goals in the late minutes to take a 7-5 into the half.
Towson rode that momentum into the second half, scoring the first 6 goals of the half and jumping out to an eight goal lead, 13-5. Delaware would add 3 goals late in the third, helping limit their deficit to five goals, 13-8 at the end of the third.
The Tigers would hold on, staying consistent offensively and defensively and finishing out the game on top, winning 18-11.
Delaware’s season comes to an end with a record of 10-5. Those 10 wins are the most for the Blue Hens in a season since 2011. The Hens also reached the the CAA tournament for the second consecutive year, an accomplishment they haven’t achieved since 2010-11.