Beavers capture NEWMAC regular season crown and top seed in conference tournament 

BABSON PARK, Mass.— Graduate student Will Spangenberg (Dover, Mass.) caused a turnover, scooped up the loose ball and scored into an open net with a minute to go in the fourth quarter and Babson College ran out the clock to record a dramatic 15-14 victory over MIT in the New England Women's and Men's Athletic Conference (NEWMAC) men's lacrosse regular season finale Saturday afternoon at MacDowell Field.

With the win, the Beavers improved to 10-4 overall and captured the NEWMAC regular season title with a 6-0 conference record while defending champion MIT wrapped up the regular season at 11-5 overall and 4-2 in league games. Spangenberg's game-winner capped a contest that had a remarkable eight lead changes and 11 tie scores.

Senior Chi Chi Price (Hingham, Mass.) registered career highs with eight goals and 10 points to lead the Beavers, while graduate student Ryan Kenney (Hingham, Mass.) scored three goals and Spangenberg contributed two goals and one assist. First-year Jack Feeks (Georgetown, Mass.) added a goal and an assist, junior Jacob Tauss (San Marcos, Calif.) scored once, and senior Matt Stucchi (Rexford, N.Y.) and first-year Bennett Smith (Lake Oswego, Ore.) tallied two assists each in the victory.

Junior Grey Sunderland (Bellevue, Wash.) won 15-of-30 faceoffs and scooped up 12 ground balls, classmate Dillon Quinn (Spring Lake, N.J.) caused four turnovers and collected four ground balls, and fellow junior Brendan Maher (Melrose, Mass.) grabbed six ground balls for the Beaver defense. Senior Will Parducci (Manhattan Beach, Calif) made 14 saves in goal for the win.

Graduate student Ryan Gebhardt (Baldwinsville, N.Y.) tallied six goals and an assist for the Engineers, junior Heath Nilsen (Carlsbad, Calif.) added two goals and an assist and first-year Garrett Campagna (Lancaster, Pa.) chipped in with a goal and two assists. Senior Tory Lentine (Flemington, N.J.) and first-year Bryce Metalios (Riverside, Conn.) scored twice each in the loss and classmate Zach Bleil (New Canaan, Conn.) tallied one goal to round out the scoring for the visitors.

Sophomore Matthew Sardis (Bernardsville, N.J.) won 15-of-28 face-offs and grabbed 11 ground balls for MIT, junior Luke Chapman (Houston, Texas) and sophomore Nico Bowden (Concord, Mass.) each caused two turnovers, and senior Devin McCabe (New Castle, N.H.) made nine saves in goal in the loss.

The Beavers took a 12-11 lead into the fourth quarter and extended it to 13-11 when Price set up Kenney for a goal less than two minutes in. MIT responded with three unanswered strikes in less than three minutes, as Nilsen went back-to-back and Gebhardt put the Engineers back in front 14-13 with 7:43 to play. Price answered with his eighth goal with 6:54 on the clock to deadlock the score at 14-all, and that's where it stood until Spangenberg's key goal.

MIT won the final face-off but turned the ball over with 30 seconds remaining and Babson was able to clear the ball and run out the clock.

The Beavers took an early 2-0 lead on goals by Kenney and Price but MIT created the first lead change with three straight goals by Campagna, Bleil and Gebhardt. Babson fired in three of the next four goals, two by Price and one by Feeks, to pull ahead 5-4 after one frame. The teams went back and forth in the second quarter, trading three goals each, as the Green and White took an 8-7 lead into the break.

Babson opened the second half with a man-up goal by Price, but MIT again responded with three straight goals, two from Lentine and one from Gebhardt, to grab a 10-9 lead. The Beavers answered with three of the next four goals, including two more by Price, to pull ahead 12-11 after three.

The evenly matched teams split the 30 faceoffs, each winning 15, and both teams took 44 shots. Babson had a 44-28 advantage in ground balls and was 23 of 26 on clear attempts while MIT was good on 16-of-20.

Babson will be the top seed in next week's NEWMAC Tournament and will host a semifinal game at MacDowell Field at 7 p.m. on Thursday. Third-seeded MIT will travel to second-seeded MIT for the other semifinal on Thursday.

GAME NOTES
• Babson has won 10 of the last 13 games against the Engineers and is 31-16 all-time against MIT in a series that dates back to 1977.
• The Beavers captured their first outright regular season NEWMAC title since 2015 when they finished 7-0.
• Price became just the second player in program history to score 50 goals in a season, upping his season total to 55, and trails only Josh Shaffer, who scored 71 goals in 1995.
• Spangenberg is just the third player to record 70 points in a season, and his 71 points is third on Babson's single-season list and just two away from matching PJ Yeatman's total of 73 back in 1991.