The DePauw men's lacrosse team finished their second game as a first year program Wednesday evening, losing 25-4 to the Fontbonne Griffins.
Fontbonne began the game with a 4-0 lead right away, causing the Tigers to trail from the beginning. The Griffins' senior Peter Travis led the team with ten points overall, tallying seven goals and three assists.
Senior Austin Schile said the team knew it would be a hard game going in.
"We knew Fontbonne is better than we are because they've had a program longer than us," Schile said. "They have better skills than us."
On offense, the four goals were attributed to Schile, junior Sam Johnson, freshman Cameron Combs and sophomore Pierce Ellinwood. Senior Greg Lambert and senior Jack Glerum both received assists.
Despite losing the game, the team excelled in their face offs. Freshman John Zupancic, a young leader on the team, stood out from the rest of the team, upping his face-off percentage to 72.3 percent as he won 24 of 31 face-offs. He now leads the North Coast Athletic Conference in that statistical category.
Zupancic said the team fought hard for the ball, but fell short with their follow through for the goal.
"We got the ball on offense and just needed to get it into the back of the net. The whole team just needs to keep improving to get the win," Zupancic said.
The team is in its inaugural season and the game at Fontbonne was only the second game in team history as a varsity sport. Even though they have only been together for less than a year, there are already relationships established amongst the team.
"Everyone gets along very well," Zupancic said. "We all have a lot of enthusiasm and everyone plays well together. You can't ask much more than that, especially from a new program."
Many goals were let in, but the game could have been worse. Goalie, junior J.R. Strubbe, recorded 14 saves in the match. Back-up goalie senior Nick Lucca also saw the field for 1:42 minutes of the game.
Tigers lacrosse will continue their season and hope to add a win to their record when Carthage College comes to the Boswell field on March 9.