Article by Michael Boyle
(Photos by Mike Stack and Sarah Meiners)

St. Charles, MO (March 2, 2008) – After an early season upset against the University of Illinois last weekend, Indiana traveled to St Charles to take on their second GRLC team, the Lindenwood University Lions. However, this result would be different as the Hoosiers’ fifth game of 2008 would also be their first loss of the season. Led by Bryan Nix’s game high 7 goals, No. 14 Lindenwood rolled to 16-7 victory to win their fourth straight game.

The beginning of the game was a defensive battle on both sides of the field, but the Lions eventually took a 2 point lead.

The Hoosiers had their chances early when an illegal stick penalty left the Lions man-down for the final three minutes of the first quarter. But the Lions’ defense denied Indiana during the long penalty highlighted by junior defensiveman Andrew Schroeder strong hit of an Indiana midfielder a mere few seconds into the penalty after play resumed.

The Lions’ improved their lead to 5-0 in the first stanza. Quick LU clears by senior d-man Daniel Meiners and junior goalie Tim Jennings gave muliple chances to the Lindenwood offense. Junior middie Mike Coursault, junior attackmen Adam Stewart, and Nix each scored goals before the first period ended.

Indiana pressed hard in the second quarter, opening with a wicked sidearm goal by Senior attack Sam Angelotta. The goal was the first of three tallies on the afternoon as the senior from Hudson, Ohio led all Hoosiers in scoring.

Senior Dan Wyatt returned the favor for LU to push the lead back to five goals. The goal for goal trend of the second quarter would end shortly enough, and the Lions would put in 7 goals to the Hoosiers’ 3 before the half to take an 8-goal lead into the break.

Led by freshman goalie Phillip Johnson and sophomore d-man Garrett Stack, the Indiana defense finally settled down in the 2nd half limiting Lindenwood to 4 goals the rest of the game. Sophomore attack Matt Loveland (Upper Arlington, OH) had 2 goals for the Hoosiers on the afternoon and showcased his deft riding abilities against the Lindenwood defense.

In the end, it was not enough, and Indiana was not able to maintain its perfect record for the 2008 season. Indiana begins CCLA play in 3 weeks against Pittsburgh while Lindenwood hosts No. 18 Texas A&M and No. 20 Simon Fraser at Hunter Stadium next weekend.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 4th, 2008 at 7:05 am and is filed under CCLA, GRLC, MCLA News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.