PROVIDENCE, Rhode Island — Maryland men’s lacrosse coach John Tillman hadn’t lost in an NCAA tournament quarterfinal match in his first five years with the program. The Terps had reached the Final Four four times. In three of those tries, they advanced to and fell in the national championship.
Saturday in Brown Stadium, his squad ensured the sixth-year coach would remain undefeated in NCAA tournament quarterfinal games.
Maryland struggled at the faceoff X, finishing the game 9-for-24, but the No. 1-seed Terps used a 5-0 spurt spanning the first two quarters to open a lead they wouldn’t relinquish in their 13-7 victory over No. 8-seed Syracuse.
Behind hat tricks from three players, the Terps advance to championship weekend for the fifth time under Tillman. In Philadelphia next weekend, Maryland will play the winner of the quarterfinal bout between No. 5-seed Brown and Navy.
“Not maybe our cleanest performance, but I think the kids found a way,” Tillman said. “The guys shared the ball. We were efficient. We were opportunistic.”
Attackman Matt Rambo entered the contest with 24 points in his previous five games. Against the Orange, he built on that production, tallying a game-high six points, four of which came in the first half, on four goals and two assists.
Midfielder Pat Young tacked on four goals, while attackman Dylan Maltz, who transferred to College Park after playing his freshman season with Syracuse, added three goals. Midfielder Bryan Cole also racked up four assists as seven Terps contributed at least one point to push the team past the ACC tournament champions.
“It’s kind of hard to cover everyone at once,” Orange defender Brandon Mullins said, “and whenever they had an open man, they saw it.”
Syracuse midfielder Tim Barber netted the game’s first goal about three minutes into the contest, but Maryland’s attack heated up soon after.
The first of five straight scores came from Rambo at the 10:15-mark. About three minutes later, attackman Colin Heacock fed Young at the top of the zone, and the senior used a one-hop hurl to put the Terps ahead.
Attackman Dylan Maltz capped the spurt with the first two of his three scores in the contest. The first came as he streaked up the middle of the attacking third, corralled a pass from midfielder Tim Rotanz and punched it past Orange goalkeeper Evan Molloy. The junior turned toward the sideline and pounded his fist on his chest before his teammates wrapped him in a group embrace.
About five minutes later, Maltz pounded his chest again, this time on the other end of the field, facing the Terps bench after he sparked the second quarter scoring. He had redirected a feed from Rambo, whose hands shot up as the ball hit the back of the net.
Barber ended Maryland’s run about two and a half minutes later, but Maltz wasn’t finished against the team with which his brother was a captain for two years and his father won a national title in 1983. With the 30-second stall warning running against Maryland’s possession, the Ashburn, Virginia, native cut to the goal and redirected a feed from Rambo.
Though Maryland — who rotated between faceoff specialist Austin Henningsen and midfielder Will Bonaparte at the X — went 4-for-12 on draws and the Orange outshot the Terps 21-15 in the half, Syracuse couldn’t counter on offense.
Goalkeeper Kyle Bernlohr recorded eight first-half saves in net, including two man-down stops, en route to a career-high 16-save performance.
“I’m just trying to stay composed myself and stay poised,” Bernlohr said. “As a goalie, when you start expressing concern over your own game, that’s when you allow the other team to get on you.”
The Orange had an opportunity to cut into the Terps’ 7-3 lead before the break as Orange coach John Desko called a timeout with 49 seconds left to set a play on the last possession, but Syracuse skipped a pass out of bounds.
In the second half, Syracuse had another chance to swing momentum as they pulled within three multiple times and won all six third-quarter faceoffs. But a penalty on Syracuse attackman Nate Solomon with seven minutes left in the period allowed the Terps to widen the gap with the player advantage.
“We thought if we could have got to two, with [midfielder] Ben [Williams] winning the faceoffs, we could have put a little pressure on them,” Desko said. “But every time we got within [three], they had an answer for us.”
The Terps regrouped to win five of the six faceoffs in the final frame.
Sitting in the postgame press conference with a black hat over his new, close-shaven haircut, Tillman had a theory for his team’s drive.
In the week leading up to the team’s 15th straight win, Fionn Crimmins, a five-year-old boy the Terps adopted through Team IMPACT, lost his hair from chemotherapy treatments.
Before taking on Syracuse for the right to play in the Final Four for the third straight time, most of the Terps shaved their heads, too.
“I felt like, ‘All right, we have a team that believes in more than just themselves and a team that buys into looking out for others,'” Tillman said. “It’s been a total team all year.”
