The Roger Williams University men’s lacrosse team competed in an aggressive game Saturday afternoon against the Golden Bears of Western New England University on the Hawks’ senior day. The Hawks lost to the Golden Bears by a final score of 12-8.

Hawks’ seniors Eddie Hill, Justin MacIntyre, Owen Love and Tim Walch were honored before Saturday’s game for their contributions to the lacrosse program over their four years.

Both teams came out aggressive and wanting to compete. With a little over one minute into the game, a goal was scored by the Golden Bears’ Nick Gamba, assisted by Matthew Greer.

The Hawks battled back to try to score.

Each and every ground ball was a battle between the teams. Hawks freshman Tim Mullane picked up a critical ground ball with 9:18 left in the first, leading RWU to answer back with a goal by freshman Gabe Reale a few seconds later, assisted by sophomore Jude Marzec. At the 6:37 mark, assisted by WNE’s Brendan Lyons, Gamba scored the second goal for the Golden Bears. Lyons then scored with 3:46 left in the quarter for a 3-1 WNE lead.

With 2:08 left, MacIntyre scored a goal leaving the Hawks behind 3-2. With one second left in the first quarter, Mullane came in with an assist by freshman Brenden Whitten to tie up the game 3-3 to end the first quarter.

To begin the second quarter, Gamba scored two goals for a 5-3 WNE lead. One to start with 1:05 into the quarter, another at the 7:42 mark. The Golden Bears also got goals from Johnny Shahpazian at 4:27 and Jared Ward at 13:12 in the second quarter. The Hawks had one goal in the second quarter by Marcez scored at the 6:54 mark. The quarter ended with a score of 7-4 and WNE in the lead.

Halftime gave the Hawks time to regroup and focus. RWU made an adjustment by starting junior Weston Nolan at goalie, who later made some amazing saves. Gabe Reale set the tone on offense with a score off an assist by Mullane with 6:24 left. Nicholas Beauchamp of the Golden Bears came back with a goal at 2:42 making the score 8-5. Mullane came in strong with four seconds left in the quarter scoring a goal with an assist from Reale. Ending the quarter 8-6 with the Golden Bears still in the lead.

To start the fourth quarter, Gamba scored the first goal to make the lead 9-6. Another goal by the Golden Bears from Tim Breau made it 10-6. Mullane answered Breau with a goal from an assist from MacIntyre. Freshman Peter Navarro scored at 4:18 to make it a 10-8 game, but Gamba scored his sixth goal at the 1:49 mark and a goal from Greer with 39 seconds left in the game put a Hawks win out of reach.

With the loss, RWU falls to 6-7 overall on the season and 2-4 in the Commonwealth Coast Conference, sitting at seventh place.

Two away games next week at Nichols College and Gordon College with a playoff berth on the line will finish out the regular season for the Hawks.