New Paltz, NY – After more than a year since taking the field for its inaugural season, the State University of New York at New Paltz opened up year two Friday at home against Utica College.

Despite entering the game shorthanded, missing a few key starters, the Hawks battled back-and-forth with the Pioneers (2-0 overall) who opened up their 2021 season against Castelton on Wednesday. Although SUNY New Paltz tied the score five times throughout the game, it couldn't gain and maintain the lead down the stretch due to a few costly turnovers and penalties in the final minutes of the fourth quarter and ultiamtely fell, 9-6.

"Being short-handed definitely hurt us. I think the entire game we played smart, played an intelligent game and as we got tired we started to have mental breakdowns," said Hawks coach Dwayne Stewart. "I think that's what happened there, just us being tired and Utica doing a good job of getting their riders in and I think that held us back a little bit."
 
Early turnovers allowed Utica to dominate possession early in the first quarter, but SUNY New Paltz stood strong defensively backed by a solid outing from sophomore Nate Lindsay (16 saves). The Pioneers capitalized off a turnover and got on the board first with a goal by Dale Wagner with about four minutes left in the quarter. The Hawks quickly responded, however, as junior Dylan Fraser scored his first career goal with the blue and orange after finishing off a feed from Aidan Gregory.

Utica went up by two early in the second after putting away an opportunity to end the first 15 minutes and again to start the second, but freshmen Ryan Kaelin and John Reese each tallied back-to-back unassisted goals and willed their team back in and tied the score, 3-3.
 

The third quarter went back-and-forth between the two programs, with Wagner again finding the back of the cage to begin the second half. After a strong defensive stand by the SUNY New Paltz defense, Joseph Bradbury picked up a ground ball and helped with a successful clear. Gregory took advantage of the offensive possession and netted his first of two goals on the day, splitting two defenders and whipping a shot bottom corner for the score to knot the game at fours. 
Consecutive penalties allowed Utica to take advantage and secure the lead once more at 5-4, but Gregory was there again for his team to create another stalemate. The Pioneers jumped ahead to end the period though, as James Daniele capitalized off a caused turnover by teammate Zach Shaler with about two minutes remaining in the quarter.

Aiden Jones kept the Hawks in the game with a goal about five minutes into the fourth. Fraser ripped a shot from the top of the cage with Utica goalie Jozef Korpics making a nice save on the attempt, but Jones was there to clean up in front of the net, scooping up the ground ball and placing it in the goal to tie the score at 6-6.

SUNY New Paltz's momentum stopped there, however. Fatigue started to weigh in and the Hawks committed costly penalties to coincide with un-caused turnovers in the middle of the field that allowed the Pioneers to take advantage. Utica scored a man-up goal with nine minutes to go, which gave them the go-ahead lead and they added two more following a shot-clock violation by the hosts and then another turnover near midfield to push its cushion to two. Wagner added one more insurance goal with about five minutes left following a faceoff win by Josh Bennett.

The Hawks were out-shot 48-29 after getting bookended with lopsided first and fourth quarter totals, getting out-shot 31-9 in those 30 minutes combined. Matt Brignati and Jozef Harvan combined to be solid on the faceoff, winning eight opportunities to the Pioneers four with Brignati going 5-of-6 on his attempts.

"Guys did step up. We definitely did see a hitch in our offense, which we knew was going to happen but to the level we didn't know," Stewart said. "We were able to put in six goals. We had a lot of opportunities. Utica's goalie really played well. The ones that were on cage we definitely made him jump for them and he made some good saves. Hopefully, we can figure something out in this week of practice and get these guys going in the right direction."

The Hawks are back on the South Turf Field next Friday against Plattsburgh State in the program's first State University of New York Athletic Conference (SUNYAC) action. Faceoff is scheduled for 4 p.m.  



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