Sophomore Derek Maltz (Ashburn, Va.) registered his second hat trick in the last three games, but No. 2 Johns Hopkins (7-0) held No. 6 Syracuse (3-2) scoreless for a stretch of more than 20 minutes from the second to the fourth quarter and defeated the Orange, 11-7, Saturday, March 17 at Homewood Field.
The loss snapped Syracuse’s five-game winning streak against the Blue Jays. Prior to Saturday, the last time Hopkins beat the Orange was exactly five years ago when the Blue Jays posted a 17-9 decision on March 17, 2007 at the Carrier Dome.
Maltz tallied three of the Orange’s four first-half goals to raise his team-leading total to 12 for the season. In addition, Syracuse received multi-point games from senior Tommy Palasek (Rocky Point, N.Y.) and junior JoJo Marasco (Yorktown Heights, N.Y.). Palasek, who played for the Blue Jays for two years before coming to Syracuse, finished with one goal and one assist against his former team. Marasco passed out two assists to extend his point streak to 13 games.
“Once we got going we started to make it competitive in the second quarter and we had some opportunities to make it a little closer,” SU head coach John Desko said. “But my hat’s off to them. I think they (Johns Hopkins) are a very good team. They limited our opportunities and we had to play from behind for most of the game.”
Syracuse never led in the contest as the Blue Jays grabbed a 1-0 advantage less than a minute into game on a 12-yard shot by John Greeley. After Marasco found Maltz inside for an extra-man goal that tied the score, Greeley put the hosts in front by one again with a man-up tally at the 6:32 mark, starting a 3-0 Hopkins run that made the score 4-1 after the opening quarter.
Maltz stopped the Blue Jays’ run, scoring 1:46 into the second quarter off a feed from Palasek to trim the Hopkins advantage to 4-2. However, the two sides traded goals for the rest of the period and the Blue Jays took a 7-4 lead into the locker room at halftime.
The Blue Jays won the opening faceoff of the third quarter and Brandon Benn scored nine seconds into the period to push the lead to 8-4. Benn added two more third-quarter goals, and the Blue Jay defense shut out SU in the period.
The Orange scoring drought reached 20:14 before an unassisted goal by Palasek with 13:15 to play stopped the Blue Jays’ run and cut the deficit to 10-5. An extra-man goal by senior Tim Desko (Syracuse, N.Y.) closed gap to 10-6 with 4:49 remaining, but the Orange couldn’t get any closer.
Benn led the Blue Jays with four goals and five points. Hopkins also got nine points from its first midfield line of John Ranagan (2g, 1a), John Greeley (2g, 1a) and Rob Guida (1g, 2a).
The Blue Jays’ midfield scoring helped offset the lack of production by leading scorer Zach Palmer, who entered the game with 25 points. Orange junior defenseman Brian Megill (Clark, N.J.) held Palmer to just one goal Saturday, an empty-netter with just over a minute left and the SU defense pressing to regain possession.
Each side registered two extra-man goals in the contest. The Orange finished 2-for-7 (.286) with the man advantage, while the Blue Jays were 2-for-5 (.400). Hopkins outshot Syracuse for the game, 36-29. They also won 13 of the game’s 20 faceoffs behind a 12-for-18 (.667) performance by Mike Poppleton. Syracuse held the edge in ground balls, 27-17.
Blue Jay goalie Pierce Bassett made nine saves to earn the win. Orange goaltender Matthew Lerman (Villanova, Pa.) played the full 60 minutes for the first time in his career and registered eight saves, one short of his personal best.
The Orange returns home on Wednesday, March 21 to face BIG EAST foe Providence at 7 p.m. in the Carrier Dome. The game will be televised live on Time Warner Cable Sports and SportsNet New York (SNY).