After No. 3 Amherst dropped a midweek contest to Wesleyan, first place in the NESCAC was up for grabs on Saturday, when No. 6 Tufts and Trinity, then both undefeated in the conference, faced off. In the end, the host Bantams prevailed 9-8 in overtime to grab sole possession of the conference lead, while Tufts dropped to 3-1 in the NESCAC and fell into a third-place tie with No. 14 Bowdoin.
The Bantams, unranked in the most recent USILA top 20 poll, embraced the underdog role and came out firing on all cylinders. Junior attackman Rob Nogueras led the way with three goals, including the game-winner in extra time, while junior midfielder Nick Shaheen also notched a hat trick. Eight different Bantams lit up the scoreboard in the game.
"Trinity earned it," sophomore midfielder Kane Delaney said. "We made mistakes offensively and defensively and they capitalized on them by creating turnovers and scoring some goals respectively. They converted their man-up opportunities well too, but we didn't really capitalize on the opportunities we created."
Tufts senior midfielder Nick Rhoads won 15-of-21 faceoffs, and the Jumbos outshot the Bantams 54-33, but Trinity senior keeper Peter Johnson made 19 saves and consistently frustrated the Jumbos' offensive weapons.
Senior co-captain Kevin McCormick and sophomore midfielder Peter Bowers led the Jumbos with hat tricks of their own, but Trinity held sophomore attackman Beau Wood, who ranks third in the NESCAC in points per game, to just two points.
Tufts struck first on a man-up goal from senior Jordan Korinis, and the Jumbos and Bantams traded goals until midway through the second quarter, when Shaheen scored twice to kick off a three-minute, four-goal run for Trinity.
Freshman attackman Chris Schoenhut answered by tallying his second career goal to pull the Jumbos within two going into the half, but coming out of the intermission, Nogueras buried his first two goals of the afternoon as Trinity seized an 8-4 advantage.
"[At that point] we just weren't playing as well as we should have been on both sides of the ball," junior midfielder Sam Diss said. "They had a good gameplan and executed well. We were not executing ours."
With just a minute left in the third quarter, Wood took a feed from Kevin McCormick to the net, besting Johnson to jumpstart a last-quarter comeback run for the Jumbos. With 45 seconds remaining in the third stanza, Bowers pulled the Jumbos within two on a goal assisted by Wood.
Less than a minute into the fourth quarter, McCormick notched his second goal of the day to pull Tufts within one, 8-7, but for the next 13 minutes the Jumbos were unable to tie it despite multiple golden opportunities. With a minute remaining, head coach Mike Daly called a timeout, and Tufts came out of the huddle executing its one-minute offense to a tee. Just as the Bantams appeared to be locking up the win, Bowers finished his third goal of the day with a strike at the 41-second mark to equalize for the Jumbos and force extra time.
"When we fell behind, we had a better sense of urgency, and the defense was playing well," Korinis said. "We did a good job of stepping up and riding them all over the field to create extra opportunities for ourselves, and going into overtime, we had the confidence that we were going to win."
But in the end, all Bowers' equalizer did was prolong the Jumbos' fate. With 1:37 to go in overtime, Nogueras received a feed from first-year attackman Matthew Hauck and found the back of the net to seal the victory.
Tomorrow, the Jumbos, who will likely drop further in the USILA rankings, travel to non-conference Babson College, before visiting Middlebury on Thursday and rounding out a blistering five-game road tour at Williams on Saturday.
"It's always unacceptable and frustrating to lose, but we have to look forward," Korinis said. "With our schedule, we don't have time to dwell on it and we have to focus on improving as a team just as we would have if we'd won."
