Men's Lacrosse Honors Eight Seniors; Falls to Cornell 17-7

Casey scores three goals on Senior Day

by Nathan Baliva

MONMOUTH, Ill. (04/30/2023) — The Monmouth College men's lacrosse team lost their season finale at home to Cornell 17-7 on Saturday. The Scots (1-13, 0-5) honored eight seniors, including Michael Casey (Chicago, Illinois) who led the team with a hat trick on Saturday.

Cornell scored the first two goals of the game before Kai Johnson (Sun Prairie, Wisconsin) got the Scots on the board. The Rams put the next seven goals on the board to lead 9-1. Ben Lafrenere (Schaumburg, Illinois) ended their run with 5:55 to play in the half on a goal assisted by Casey.

Cornell led 10-2 at half and Monmouth scored twice in seven seconds. Casey scored with 9:24 to play in the third before Gordon Kiesgen (Spring Grove, Illinois) won the faceoff and scored seven seconds later.

The Rams pushed the lead to 12-4 at the end of the third. Casey scored just 21 seconds into the fourth quarter on an assist from Carlos Hernandez (Billings, Montana). Down 13-5, Hernandez scored on an assist from Casey but the Rams scored three straight to extend the lead to 10. Casey scored the final Scots goal of the season with 1:35 to play.

Kiesgen was an impressive 24-for-28 on faceoffs and led the team with eight ground balls. Goalkeeper Nehemiah Declaw (Aurora, Illinois) made 15 saves and finished the season with 212, second-most in a season in school history.

MONMOUTH MOMENTS: The Scots honored eight seniors in a pre-game ceremony. Two of those seniors, Teagan Simons (Littleton, Colorado) and James Nowicki (Westchester, Illinois) were returning All-Conference selections who missed the entire 2023 season through injury. Simons is Monmouth's single-season and career wins leader in goal and also holds both the single-season and career records for saves and save percentage. Kain Donohoo (St. Charles, Illinois) injured his knee in the Edgewood game on March 11 and missed the final eight games. He finished third on the team in goals (19) and points (25). For his career, Donohoo leaves Monmouth with the career assists record (36) and the career records for points per game and assists per game. He also ranks seconds on the Monmouth career list in goals (87), points (123) and goals per game. Casey ranks fourth on the Scots career list with 52 goals and 30 assists and 82 points. He moved into fourth on the points list on Saturday, passing Chase Cranford. He also moved into fourth on the single-season points list with 38 and into fifth on the single-season goals list with 29. Kiesgen is Monmouth's single-season and career leader in ground balls, faceoffs won and faceoff percentage. On Saturday he set the single-season faceoffs won record at 225, passing his total of 204 from last year. Gavin Conway (Steeleville, Illinois), Garrett Cranford (McHenry, Illinois) and LH Bond (Fishers, Indiana) are all seniors as well. Conway had four ground balls on Saturday while Cranford and Bond had one eachBond scored 14 goals in 24 games for his career. Conway had one goal in 2023 and one in 2022.