UVA won its sixth men’s lacrosse national championship, defeating the 2018 champ, Yale, 13-9, on Memorial Day.
The ‘Hoos (17-3) didn’t need to rally late in this one, after coming back from a five-goal deficit in the fourth quarter to defeat Maryland in the quarterfinals, then erasing a two-goal lead for Duke in a two-overtime win in the national semifinals.
Virginia led 2-1 at the end of the first quarter, 6-2 at the half, and rode a five-goal run in the third to an 11-5 lead entering the fourth.
Yale (15-4) would only get as close as four in the final frame.
Goalie Alex Rode was stellar in the net, with 13 saves.
Matt Moore had four goals and an assist for Virginia, with Michael Krauss adding three goals, and Dox Aitken and Petey LaSalla each scoring two.
The win capped a memorable run for Virginia in 2019. The Cavaliers had started the season just 1-2, with a blowout loss at Loyola (Md.) and a home loss to High Point, before reeling off a trio of overtime wins, over Princeton, Syracuse and Brown, en route to a 16-1 finish that included the ACC regular-season and tournament championships.
The win over Duke in the national semis broke an 11-game losing streak to the Blue Devils.
Then came the finale, which saw Virginia dominate basically from the outset.
It was the second national championship of the spring for UVA, which, of course, also won the men’s basketball championship last month.
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Chris Graham
