Five goals lit the lamp for Sean Daly as he led UMass Boston over University of New England, 15–8. Daly now has 26 goals through just seven games this year, totaling out to 36 points—17 more than any other Beacon, according to Beacons Athletics. (1)
While Daly continues to dazzle, the difference in the Beacons’ play against University of New England was depth. Andrew Lawrence of the Nor’easters almost matched Daly’s seven points with six of his own, but Lawrence didn’t have much help. Two points from Collin Jackson was sole second place, which would be tied with Timothy Sullivan for fourth on the Beacons.
UMass Boston was better in every way against the Nor’easters; they outshot them and won both the turnover and the ground ball battle, along with a 17–10 edge on faceoffs—Matt Lucozzi has a career .635 faceoff percentage. The Beacons did it all, have done it all, and are showing how well-rounded their roster is.
Goalkeeper James Boldy stopped eight and gave up as many; his save percentage is still sitting below .500 through seven games. So far, if anything, this has been the biggest area of concern. Boldy is going to have to be better than he was against the so-so Nor’easters moving forward.
Picking up this win was important; after a four-game win streak to start the season, UMass Boston dropped two straight in Texas. This included an uncharacteristic, high-scoring defeat to Southwestern University, 18–17. It’s the program’s first loss while scoring 15 plus in 25 years—the last being a 16–15 overtime loss to Keene State in 1999. (1)
Now back in the win column, the Beacons improved to a 5–2 record after their win over the Nor’easters. That tied them with Western Connecticut State University for first in the Little East Conference, says littleeast.com. (2) Again, these two teams are atop the LEC; WestConn bested the Beacons in the conference championship a year ago—but these Beacons are hungry and loaded.
Six players for UMass Boston have already eclipsed 10 points, including freshman Dale Wills, who has both seven goals and assists. (1) Senior Greg Wolff already has one more goal than he had all of last season, accounting for 18 scores after finishing with 17 in 2023. (1) But this talented team’s production and success was all but foreseen; the catalyst of it all, Daly, is a transfer graduate student from Franklin Pierce University. He’s already four points shy of the highest point total in his career, 40, per Franklin Pierce Athletics. (3) Daly is dominating at the Division III level, Franklin Pierce is a Division II school.
Not to mention it’s their first season without the all-time point, goal and assist leader, Gavin Admirand. With no Admirand to fall back on, Daly and company will need to continue this rate of production. But this season, so far, has been full of surprises.
Seven games in, the “overperforming” narrative is seemingly out of the picture. The production is for real, and now people have seen a response rather than a tailspin. This program will not stop winning.
After years of contention and success, UMass Boston’s championship window is still open. A standard has been set here, the staff and players have all bought into the idea of erasing the narrative that this could have been a rocky season. Championship expectations will stay here, in Boston.
- https://beaconsathletics.com/sports/mens-lacrosse/stats/2024#individual
- https://littleeast.com
- https://www.fpuravens.com/sports/mlax/2021-22/bios/daly_sean_nvvo
