NOTRE DAME, Ind. – The fourth-ranked Notre Dame men’s lacrosse team opened its home slate with an 11-7 win over No. 16 Drexel on Sunday afternoon in front of 1,626 fans inside the Loftus Sports Center. It was a men’s lacrosse record crowd for the Loftus Center.
Notre Dame (3-0) trailed 6-5 after three quarters, yet the Irish out scored the Dragons 6-1 in the final quarter to secure the victory. David Earl (Sr./M), Westy Hopkins (Fr./A) and Sean Rogers (Jr./A) all netted two goals for the Irish.
Drexel jumped out to a 3-0 lead by the 9:27 mark of the first quarter with two goals from Brendan Glynn and a Craig Owen tally.
The Fighting Irish got on the board with four seconds remaining in the opening quarter as Hopkins found the back of the net. That was the beginning of a 5-0 Notre Dame run.
The Notre Dame defense blanked the Dragons in the second quarter, while the Irish offense scored three goals in the period to grab a 4-3 lead at halftime.
All three of Notre Dame’s second-quarter goals came within a 1:05 span. Earl tallied the first score of the surge with 12:26 left in the period. Hopkins followed at the 11:44 mark, while sophomore midfielder Steve Murphy gave the Irish their first lead of the day (4-3) with 11:21 remaining.
Notre Dame upped its lead to two (5-3) as Ryan Foley scored off an assist from Earl at the 8:54 mark of the third quarter.
Three unanswered Drexel goals gave the Dragons a 6-5 lead by the end of three quarters.
Notre Dame out shot Drexel 38-27. Irish sophomore goalie John Kemp made nine saves, while Drexel’s Mark Manos had 15 stops and allowed 10 goals. John Ciavarelli surrendered one goal for Drexel.
The Irish return to action on Saturday at Denver. Opening faceoff is slated for 7:00 p.m. (MT).
