Hartford lacrosse debuted on Saturday and was attended by 1,747 fans at Al-Marzook Field.

Despite the exciting and bright setting for their season opener though, the Hartford men’s lacrosse team was unable to stop the Maryland Terrapins from walking off their home field on Saturday with a 16-4 victory to start the Hawks’ season at 0-1.

“It just wasn’t clicking for us today,” said men’s lacrosse head coach Peter Lawrence said about loss to the No. 2 team in the nation that entered the game after beating Mount St. Mary’s 23-6.

“I think partly it’s because we kept shooting ourselves in the foot in the beginning, and when you don’t get it rolling you start playing tight, because you then feel like everything has to be perfect, and, there was still a lot of time left in the game.”

The Hawks failed to move the ball around on offense and didn’t score in until late in the first quarter.

It wasn’t until there was 1:33 left in the first that Hartford scored their first goal, the Terrapins had already score three goals themselves.

“We just needed some more guys to show up today, and make a few more plays,” Lawrence said, as his Hawks were outshot 51-32.

Along with needing guys to show up, Lawrence also said it was the Fifty-fifty ground balls that plagued Hartford in the loss.

“They weren’t even necessarily those ground balls in the face off area, it was just loose balls,” Lawrence said, as his Hawks were out ground-balled 38-20.

That first Hartford goal coming from Andrew Cacchio on an assist from Jack Bobzien, Maryland’s first four goals before then came from Owen Blye, Kevin Cooper, Jake Bernhardt, all unassisted, and Mike Chanenchuk on an assist from John Haus.

Maryland’s Cooper would score an unassisted goal once more after Cacchio’s to give the Terps a 4-1 lead at the end of the first quarter.

Cooper then assist Haus’ second goal of the game, to start the second quarter, before Hartford’s goalie and defense would see eight more goals until 5:56 remained in the third quarter with the Hawks would score again.

An unassisted goal that was scored by Dew Haig at that point, Hartford would allow two more Maryland goals, from Jay Carlson and Billy Gribbin, before entering the fourth quarter.

During which, both teams switched goalies to start, with Hartford replacing Frank Piechota with Dan Zenevitch. Piechota left after allowing the 15 goals, while also making 13 saves.

Maryland replaced Niko Amato, who allowed the two goals while making eight saves, with Kyle Bernlohr.

With the new goalies protecting the nets, Hartford was able to score first, on a goal from Jared Franze assisted by Garret Dollard, and Austin Gorman assisted by Haig, before Maryland’s Bobby Gribbin would score once more on an assist from Brendan Saylor to make the final 16-4.

Zenevitch would finish allowing the one goal with three saves, as Berhnlohr would finish allowing the two goals with four saves.

Their next game is Feb. 23.

Senior Rory Nunamacher does his best to make his way to the net, but the Terrapin’s defense was just too stout. Brian Izzo | The Informer