Statesmen Close Out Season in Heart Finals

Oskaloosa--The William Penn men's lacrosse team was unable to continue its campaign to the final destination as it was defeated 14-8 by #2 seed St. Ambrose in the Heart of America Athletic Conference Championship Finals Saturday.

Top-seeded WPU (13-6), which was outshot 47-40 by the Fighting Bees (9-6), could not finish the title sweep; the Statesmen won the regular season crown with a 5-0 mark.

The first quarter was a back-and-forth affair as Brady Treloar (Jr., Portland, Ore., Business Management) got the Statesmen on the board first just 52 seconds into the matchup. The Fighting Bees matched the score less than a minute later however.

The navy and gold, who defeated St. Ambrose 9-7 back on April 1, responded with a goal from Breck Putzier (So., Minneapolis, Minn., Kinesiology) that was assisted by Wyatt Christensen (Fr., Madison, Wis., Biology).  Unfortunately, the away team evened the score at 2-2 with a goal to close out a low-scoring first period.

St. Ambrose found the back of the netting first in the second quarter before Putzier and Christensen beat the opposing goalkeeper to take a 4-3 lead.  The edge unfortunately did not last long as SAU countered with two tallies to go up 5-4 into intermission.  It would stand as the last lead change of the contest.

The third quarter saw the visiting crew put William Penn down 8-4 with three consecutive goals.  Nate Blasingame (So., Portland, Ore., Business Management) then finally broke the scoreless drought for WPU with an unassisted goal.  The Fighting Bees answered with two more goals in the period, though, before Putzier scored an unassisted goal to make it 10-6 with 15 minutes left in regulation.

William Penn edged even closer as Boston Romero (Jr., Las Vegas, Nev., Business Management) was helped by Putzier.  Unfortunately, SAU iced the game with four straight goals.  Treloar fired home a shot in the waning minutes, but that was all Statesmen could produce.

Putzier topped the offense with three goals and an assist, while Treloar had two scores.  Both Romero and Christensen each notched one goal with one assist.

Despite the loss, WPU held the advantage in faceoffs at 14-for-23; Ryan Swarts (Jr., Boise, Idaho, Undustrial Technology) competed in all 23 battles.  Eric Garigan (Jr., Tucson, Ariz., Political Science) tallied 12 saves in the setback.

"No one can take away from these guys that they are the conference champions," Head Coach Luke Christiansen said. "They earned the privilege to be in big time games that sting when you come up short. Not a single team won the regular season conference title and tournament title this year in the NAIA.  Every member of this program should be extremely proud of the beginning of the championship culture at WPU."