HOLLAND  — The Carthage College men's lacrosse team suffered their first loss of the season on Saturday falling in close competition to Calvin 11-9. 

• Final score: Calvin 11 - Carthage 9
• Location: Holland, Michigan - VanAndel Soccer Stadium
• Records:Calvin 2-4, Carthage 6-1

 

• Hope struck first with two quick goals, but Jacob Cameron answered late in the first quarter to put Carthage on the board, cutting the deficit to 2-1.
• The second quarter featured a surge of scoring, with Carthage fighting back. Ben Krok and Andrew Frey each found the net, evening the score at 3-3. However, Hope responded with two late goals to take a 5-3 advantage into halftime.
• Hope built on its lead in the third quarter, but Carthage stayed in the fight, as Andrew Johnson scored with just one second remaining to make it 9-4 heading into the final period.
• Carthage stormed back in the fourth, scoring five times, with key goals from Alec Gern, Jake Westland, and Andrew Frey.
• Johnson netted the equalizer with just over five minutes to play, tying the game at 9-9.
• Despite Carthage's late push, Hope capitalized in the closing minutes, scoring twice to secure the win.

• Andrew Johnson, Ben Krok and Andrew Frey all had two goals in the game and one assist in the game.  
• Jacob Cameron, Jake Westland and Alec Gern all registered a goal. 
• Chad Kohlmann recorded eight ground balls while Sam Wallace and Josh Flores had four. 
• In goal, Jake Williamson made nine saves. 

"Hope was ready. We knew they would be better than their results this season but we were not ready to play today and had very poor discipline and composure the first three quarters. That's on me and we will have to figure out where things went wrong. 

After we gave them two early uncontested goals, the defense settled in and did pretty good in our sixes. 

We made some poor clearing decisions and they all cost us goals. Penalties hurt us today too. And we didn't really have a lot of rhythm at the X so it was hard to claw back in the second and third and we kept given their offense oxygen. 

Offensively, we allowed their physicality to dictate how we played and just way too many self inflicted turnovers in the first three frames. If there is a silver lining it's that we made up all the difference in just twelve minutes of good lacrosse and locked the game up at nine."

• The Firebirds are in action on Wednesday, March 12 at 3 p.m. in Iowa.