Virginia Shakes Slow Start, Pulls Away From Albany for 16-10 Win

Perhaps suffering from a hangover following their big-time road win at Maryland on Saturday, the Cavaliers were slow and sloppy for the first 30 minutes of their next game and found themselves trailing 3-0 to an Albany team who came in with a 2-4 record. UVA managed to tie things up by halftime and then finally delivered the dominant performance that was expected in the second half. No. 3 Virginia (7-1) got five goals apiece from Payton Cormier and McCabe Millon and a six-point effort from Connor Shellenberger, who became the program's all-time points leader, and pulled away for a 16-10 victory over Albany (2-5) on Tuesday evening at Klockner Stadium. 

To say Virginia came out flat would be a massive understatement. The Cavaliers turned the ball over six times in the first quarter and didn't score until almost 12 minutes had elapsed. Albany goalie Landon Whitney, a freshman, stood on his head with six saves in the opening period, including two-consecutive doorstep stops to deny Ryan Colsey and Griffin Schutz from point-blank range. 

On the other end of the field, Albany's Silas Richmond found the back of the net three times for a hat trick within the first ten minutes, the first of which was a highlight behind-the-back shot to open the scoring. The Great Danes, who came into this game with a 2-4 record, effectively stunned the Cavaliers by jumping out to a 3-0 lead. 

Virginia finally got on the board with 3:07 left in the first quarter as Jack Boyden found Payton Cormier for a goal, but the Cavaliers still trailed 3-1 at the end of the first. Matthew Nunes made a great play to give UVA its second goal early in the second quarter, as he stepped out well beyond the crease to make a save and then immediately delivered a long-distance clearing strike to Connor Shellenberger, who then passed to an open Cormier on the fastbreak to make it 3-2, with the hockey assist going to Nunes. 

Albany sat in a zone defense for stretches of the first half that successfully stymied the UVA attack. Whitney made three more saves in the second quarter and it took the Cavaliers most of the period to finally solve the Albany defense again, with McCabe Millon threading a skip pass through the defense to Thomas Mencke, who faked a shot and found a path to the cage for the game-tying goal. 

The visiting Great Danes still felt like they had won the first half, though, as they managed to go to halftime tied up at 3-3 on the road with the nation's third-ranked team. Virginia outshot Albany 21-17 in the first half, but nine of the 12 shots the Cavaliers put on cage were saved by Landon Whitney. 

The Albany freshman goalie did not have as fun of a time in between the pipes in the third quarter. Griffin Schutz found McCabe Millon for a goal 51 seconds into the second half to give UVA the lead for good and then Connor Shellenberger painted a corner with a lefty rocket to officially break Matt Moore's record for most career points in UVA men's lacrosse program history.