Fourth-seeded Rutgers men's lacrosse couldn't get its offense going as the No. 20-ranked Scarlet Knights fell to top-seeded and No. 1 Penn State, 18-6, in the first round/semifinals of the Big Ten Tournament on Thursday evening at HighPoint.com Stadium in Piscataway.
The Nittany Lions (13-1, 6-0) held Rutgers scoreless for the final 21:16 of the first half and scored five straight goals to go into the break with an 8-2 lead. The Scarlet Knights wouldn’t score again until the 11:56 mark in the third quarter.
Just this past Saturday in Rutgers’ matchup on the road at Penn State, the Nittany Lions went up early 3-0, but the Scarlet Knights fought back to go up by one goal at the end of the first quarter. It looked that was going to be the case once against as Penn State went ahead 2-0 before Rutgers tied it at 2-2, but the polar opposite happened.
“Penn State is a talented team. They are ranked at No. 1 for a reason,” Rutgers coach Brian Brecht said. “Our lack of possessions allowed them to have more time with the ball and they are certainly capable of scoring.”
Much like rebounds in basketball to gain possession, Penn State had 45 ground balls to just 26 for Rutgers.
“It’s big. It’s extra possessions,” Brecht said of the major difference in amount of ground balls scooped up for the two teams. “There’s a couple times in the first half where we worked hard to get stops and (goalie) Max (Edelmann) had some great saves, but second chance opportunities hurt us. Those ground balls, if you give a good team more chances, eventually they’re going to find the back of the cage.”
"It's my job to corral that ball and get us possession," Edelmann added.
Penn State put on a clinic on both ends of the field, scoring with the ease with unselfish ball movement and stout defense. Grant Ament and TJ Malone led the way four goals each while Mac O’Keefe netted two three goals. Jack Kelly scored twice and Jack Traynor had one goal as well. Ament also dished out three assists.
Goalie Colby Kneese was stellar in between the wipes making 11 saves.
Ryan Gallagher netted three goals and Adam Charalambides two more for Rutgers. Edelmann, the Big Ten Co-Specialist of the Year who was tops in the country entering the day with 14.83 saves per game with a 57.2 save percentage that led the Big Ten and was fourth nationally, made 13 saves, but Penn State was just too much in control.
Charalambides was a First Team All-Big Ten selection this year along with Edelmann and Kieran Mullins, who was held in check. He had just one assist on the night.
Penn State led by as much as 13 goals in the fourth quarter.
With the loss, Rutgers ends its season with an overall 7-8 record and 2-4 within the league. Rutgers, which faced an extremely tough slate in 2019, underwhelmed facing high expectations this season. It needed to upset the best the team in the country and then win the tournament championship on Saturday night to get into the NCAA Tournament.
"I think we always want to be the best we can possibly be. I think the media puts a lot of expectations on program that they feel should be at a certain level," Brecht said when asked about the season by TKR. "We want to compete for Big Ten championships, NCAA Tournament births, and national championships. Those are certainly our goals.
"We lost 11 very talented guys from last year but we had guys like Max, Kieran, Casey (Rose), Kyle (Pless), and (Garrett) Michaeli coming back from that team. It was great to have Adam Charalambies back in the lineup. He was away for two years. ...I think we were a work in progress all season. We are a much better team than when we started. Even though we were playing our best coming in, we didn't play our best today and that happens sometimes. No guarantees once the whistle blows."
Looking ahead to 2020, Rutgers will be without 12 seniors including Pless, Edelmann, Rose, and Michaeli. Brecht will be back for his ninth season with the Scarlet Knights and still looking to get over the hump.
"All good programs are going to lose good seniors to graduation. That's the process of collegiate athletics," Brecht said. "We lost a great senior class last year and responded with a great schedule and competed in the postseason again in the Big Ten Tournament tonight. We have another talented senior class again this year. Our expectation are to play in the month of May in the postseason.
"We are going to attract and develop high-end student-athletes that will have great careers here and graduate with a lot of success and then replace that each year."
Follow Chris Nalwasky on Twitter @ChrisWasky.
