Maryland men’s lacrosse pulls away from Michigan, 16-12, for bounce-back win

Maryland men’s lacrosse rebounded from its home loss to Penn State last weekend with a 16-12 win over Michigan on senior day.

The teams kept it close for most of the first half before a late Terps run gave them a six-goal lead entering half time. Michigan pulled close with a run of its own in the third quarter, but Maryland’s stars carried the team to the finish line.

Jared Bernhardt and Logan Wisnauskas were both dominant, each scoring five goals and adding three assists. Wisnauskas bounced back in a big way following his one-goal performance against Penn State, while Bernhardt simply did his thing, logging his fifth straight game with at least three goals. Louis Dubick contributed two goals himself, while Alex Buckanavage scored three times and Decker Curran, Bryce Clay and Kevin Mack each scored twice for Michigan.

Shots and shots on goal remained pretty close between both squads, with Maryland leading 45-40 in shots and Michigan leading 26-25 in shots on goal. It was on ground balls and faceoffs that the Terps really found their advantage, as Austin Henningsen won 22 of 29 draws to help Maryland grab 42 ground balls to just 24 for Michigan.

Maryland looked a bit out-of-sync in its offensive sets to begin this game, either failing to connect on the passes it needed to or losing the ball off the dodge. Michigan also deployed an aggressive 10-man ride from the jump by pulling its goalie from the cage, which more than once baited Maryland out of its clear and into an across-the-field shot that was saved easily, giving away possession to the Wolverines. Both teams ended up trading goals through the first 15 minutes of play, with the score knotted at 3-3 after one quarter.

The Terps began to get some momentum going into the second quarter thanks to back-to-back goals from Dubick, but a couple of unlucky bounces in the form of a ball deflecting off of Danny Dolan into the net and a Maryland shot grazing off the pipe helped keep Michigan in it. But Maryland’s offense started doing a really good job of stretching Michigan’s defense thin to open up space in front of the crease, scoring three goals from that spot in the period.

The Terps started to roll from that point on, scoring three goals in the final 56 seconds of play to take a 10-6 halftime lead.

The attack began to cool down a bit coming out of the locker room, scoring just one goal during the third quarter and committing a couple of unforced errors to allow Michigan to hang around. A stagnant Terps offense helped fuel the run Michigan needed to get back into the game, as the Wolverines scored five in the quarter to cut the lead to 11-9 going into the final period.

But Maryland began to push back against the Michigan run, leaning on Bernhardt and Wisnauskas to help get some breathing room. And the talented attackmen both rose to the occasion, combining to score three unanswered goals to give back Maryland’s comfortable lead. Michigan scored three times late, but it wasn’t enough.

Maryland will hit the road for the first time in almost a month next weekend, as the Terps head to New Jersey and face Rutgers next Sunday.

Three things to know

1. Jared Bernhardt made Maryland history. With his hat trick Saturday, Bernhardt became the just the third player in team history to score at least three goals in five consecutive games, and the first since Joe Walters in 2004. Doing so in his junior year, Bernhardt can really only go up from here with still one season left for the Terps.

2. Logan Wisnauskas hit a milestone as well. Along with Bernhradt’s record-setting day, Wisnauskas tallied his 100th point as a Terp, with Bernhardt doing so earlier this season as well. Like Bernhardt, Wisnauskas still has some time left in College Park after this season, and he’s got a chance to fall in line with many of the program’s other all-time great attackmen.

3. Maryland nearly let this one get away. Reminiscent of games earlier this season against teams like Penn and Richmond, the Terps allowed a lesser opponent to put together a comeback after amassing a big lead. Maryland ultimately got the win, like those games from back in February, but seeing Maryland come close to surrendering another late lead by April isn’t necessarily ideal.