ANDERSON, S.C. – With a hard-fought 14-12 road win over Anderson on Wednesday night, the Newberry College men's lacrosse team secured the No. 4 seed in the South Atlantic Conference to set up a quick rematch with the Trojans this Saturday (April 20) in the SAC quarterfinals at Setzler Field. Game time has yet to be announced.
Newberry finishes the regular-season with an 11-3 record, matching their win total from a season ago and setting a new program-record winning percentage for a season (.786).
Scott Reed tallied six goals for the seventh time in 2024 to reach 66 goals on the campaign; the previous record for a single season in Newberry's seven-year history was 46 from
Baker Westmoreland in 2022.
Reed, who also had one assist versus AU, closes the book on the regular season leading the conference – and Division II – in both goals and points (87).
Zach Thompson added a pair of goals for the Wolves tonight, as did
Miles Jones.
Ethan Canning,
Jonny MacLean,
Mac Ryan and
Baker Westmoreland all scored once.
On defense,
Brock Strong,
Jack Travassos and
Owen Harrison each caused two turnovers. Strong and Travassos both had four ground balls and Harrison had three.
Ryan Erler moved to 11-3 in net with eight saves.
Canning set the tone early with an unassisted goal 2:11 into the outing, though the Trojans scored two goals over the remainder of the quarter to take a 2-1 lead after 15 minutes.
Four unanswered Newberry goals put them ahead 5-2 midway through the second quarter. Canning tallied his second point of the night with an assist on Ryan's goal with 11:21 left in the first half. Reed scored his first with 7:55 to go in the half, followed by Westmoreland's man-up goal a minute and 30 seconds later, and Jones' first goal 25 seconds after that.
The Trojans scored twice to narrow the gap to 5-4 before Reed got one off before the halftime horn to give the Wolves a 6-4 lead at the break.
MacLean got the Scarlet and Gray off and running in the second half with a goal 40 seconds in for a three-goal cushion. After Anderson responded, Reed restored an 8-5 advantage and completed his hat-trick with 11:13 remaining in the third quarter.
A pair of AU goals made it an 8-7 nailbiter but the Wolves scored three of the game's next four goals for an 11-8 lead after 45 minutes. Once again, Newberry beat the horn, this time Thompson scored off a feed from Reed with just three seconds left in the third.
Anderson found the back of the net just 33 seconds into the fourth and final quarter to bring its deficit back down to two, 11-9. Reed scored twice seven minutes apart to make it 13-9 – the latter a man-up goal – with just under six minutes to go.
AU outscored the Wolves 3-1 in the closing minutes, but it was too little too late.
Stay tuned to newberrywolves.com for the latest on Saturday's conference tournament rematch.
