M. Lax Thumps Holy Cross

The No. 18 Harvard men's lacrosse team continued its unbeaten season with a decisive thrashing of Holy Cross, 19-4, last night at Harvard's Jordan Field.

Harvard (3-0, 0-0 Ivy) started strong, when junior Michael Baly scored the Crimson's first goal only one minute and 20 seconds into the first quarter, and never looked back.

The Harvard scoring attack was led by senior co-captain Dana Sprong, who has a team-high six goals to go with a pair of assists.

"It was a good game for us," said Sprong, "It was a really good first half but got a little sloppy in the second half when it got colder and the rain started to come down harder. It was a good showing."

The Crimson went up 12-0 before allowing the first Holy Cross goal near the end of the second period.

There was little doubt the Crimson would do anything but roll, said freshman attacker Jeff Gottschall.

"We knew we were the better team coming in but we still had to play well," Gottschall, who assisted on the Crimson's eleventh goal, said.

Sophmore Doug Logigian had four goals and an assist while sophomore Matt Primm and freshman Brian Weeks rounded out the list of multiple-point scorers with two goals apiece.

Primm was named to this week's Ivy League Honor Roll after scoring 5 goals and notching a pair of assists in Harvard's 21-5 win over Boston College last Saturday at Jordan. The sophomore now has eight goals on the year.

Harvard largely owed the win to its defense, which allowed only 23 shots on goal to the Crimson's 50.

It was the second straight game that Harvard outshot its opponent by a large margin. The Crimson outshot B.C. 55-22 on Saturday.

Harvard was also dominant on the faceoffs, winning 16 to Holy Cross' 11.

Freshman netminder James McKenna was yet another bright spot in the Harvard defense. McKenna should continue to lead the Ivy League with his low 2.69 goals-against average after allowing only 5 goals in the Harvard victory.

"We have room to improve but today was good," Gotschall said. "We got our first couple of offensive lines going and we scored well in the first half."

Holy Cross was limited to only four goals with Crusader attacker Mark Turnuzzuer scoring half of those.

The Crimson has an umblemished record thus far after the B.C. win last week and an 8-4 win over Providence in the season's opener.

"We are playing pretty well," Sprong said. "There are moments when we look a little sloppy, but collectively we are playing pretty well."

Harvard cannot afford to be sloppy during its busy spring break week ahead of itself as it starts its Ivy league season this weekend with a game at Jordan Field on Sunday against No. 17 Pennsylvania (1-2, 0-1 Ivy).

"It's the real start of our season," said Gotschall. "We are going to face a long strech of real good teams. We will have to play pretty well."

The Crimson travels to Fairfield on Tuesday of next week for a make-up game before returning to Jordan for a March 31st showdown with perennial contender No. 10 Duke(5-2).

"Both Penn and Duke are playing pretty well," said Sprong. "We will have to be on top of our game to beat them."

With any luck, when Harvard's undergrads return from their fun in the sun, the Crimson will have a strong 6-0 record after knocking off two of the nation's top 20 teams.