CAMBRIDGE, Mass. – Jeff Cohen tallied a career-high five goals and handed out an assist and Travis Burr also netted a career-best by scoring four times to guide the No. 16 Harvard men's lacrosse team to a non-conference victory against Hartford Friday evening at Cumnock Turf. Jesse Fehr added a hat trick and Nick Smith won 14 face-offs for the Crimson cause, helping the team improve its record to 3-1 on the season.

Harvard scored three times in the first five minutes and led, 6-0, after the first period of play. Burr opened the scoring with the game's only man-up goal, coming at 11:31. Less than 10 seconds later, Smith found the back of the net on an unassisted goal before Terry White gave Harvard a 3-0 lead after receiving a pass from Nick Sapia at 10:19.

Jason Duboe, Burr and Cohen each added goals later in the period, making it a 6-0 contest. The Crimson held a 12-2 advantage in shots and collected 13 of 18 ground balls in the first.

The Hawks had a two-goal run midway through the second as Ryan Compitello and Vinny Pellizzi got Hartford (0-4) on the scoreboard. Kevin Vaughan handed out his second assist of the day on a Jeff Wannop score at 6:42, and Duboe followed with another unassisted tally at 4:51, pushing Harvard's lead to 8-2. Hartford's Carter Bender and Burr traded goals late in the half, as the Crimson took a 9-3 advantage into the break.

After Hartford scored twice within an eight-second window around the 10-minute mark of the third, the Crimson went on an 8-0 run as the team fired on all cylinders. Fehr started the run with a score at 8:41 after receiving a pass from Cohen. Two minutes later, Fehr dished out an assist to Burr, who netted his fourth goal at 6:29. Cohen added his third and fourth scores at 6:13 and 2:26, respectively, before Fehr closed out the scoring in the third with an unassisted chance at 1:29.

Early in the fourth, Max Motschwiller became the eighth Crimson player to find the back of the net, as he scored at 14:09. Cohen collected his fifth at 13:00 before Fehr capped the run at 8:23, giving Harvard its largest lead of the day, 18-5.

Joe Pike played nearly 55 minutes in cage and made five saves, including two in the first and third quarters. The Crimson outshot the Hawks, 47-15, and grabbed 39 ground balls, compared to 30 for Hartford. The Hawks won 15-of-29 face-offs in the contest. Harvard held Hartford scoreless on three man-up opportunities, while the Crimson was successful on 1-of-4 attempts.

Harvard's 18 goals on the evening represented the most for the program, since the team defeated Holy Cross, 19-9, back on May 1, 2004.

Up next, the Crimson will open the Ivy League portion of its schedule when the team hosts Penn at Harvard Stadium Saturday, March 21. The game is slated to begin at 1:00 p.m.

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CAMBRIDGE, MA – The University of Hartford lacrosse team dropped an 18-7 decision to 16th-ranked Harvard University on Friday evening at Cumnock Turf.

Harvard (3-1 overall) got out to a quick lead behind a 6-0 first quarter and never looked back. Jeff Cohen led the Crimson with five goals and an assist while Travis Burr added four goals. Freshman Carter Bender and sophomore Vinny Pellizzi each scored two goals to lead Hartford (0-4 overall).

Burr got the Crimson going with a man-up score just 3:30 into the contest. Harvard followed with five more tallies in the stanza and led 6-0 when Cohen netted his first goal of the night with 1:40 to play in the quarter.

Hartford finally got on the board midway through the second quarter on a shot by freshman Ryan Compitello off a feed from classmate Aidan Genik. The Hawks followed with their second goal nearly 40 seconds later, as Compitello fed Pellizzi to cut the deficit to 6-2. Harvard, however, closed the half with three of the next four goals and led 9-3 at the break.

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2009-03-13