Hempstead, NY - The Hofstra men's lacrosse team suffered its first Colonial Athletic Association loss of the season with a 16-10 defeat to 13th-ranked Massachusetts Tuesday (Mar. 30) afternoon from James M. Shuart Stadium.

The loss drops Hofstra to 4-2 overall and 1-1 in the conference as the three-game winning streak for the Pride comes to an end. The Minutemen improve to 3-1 overall and 3-0 against CAA competition.

Massachusetts opened the game with two consecutive goals, but the Pride evened things up quickly with a pair of Lynskey-assisted goals by sophomore Justin Sykes to even the score. The Minutemen added another two to the scoreboard to bring the score to 4-2 for the visitors. A goal at the the start of the second quarter grew the Massachusetts lead to three, but Hofstra cut the deficit to one with goals by Lynskey and senior Bryce Tolmie just 40 seconds apart. However, the Minutemen rattled off four straight goals to lead 9-4 at halftime.

Senior James Philbin and sophomore Colton Rudd found the back of the net for Hofstra at the start of the third before the teams traded goals to put the score at 11-8, with Lynskey and Rudd scoring during the back-and-forth exchange. Massachusetts scored twice inside the final five minutes, putting the visitors ahead by five entering the final quarter. Senior Ryan Tierney scored twice to bring the Pride to within three at the start of the fourth quarter, but they couldn't find another goal as the Minutemen ended the game with three straight tallies to pull away with the win.

Tierney, Lynskey, Sykes and Rudd all scored twice in today's game, while Philbin and Tolmie found the back of the net once. Lynskey set a new season-high with three assists against the Minutemen, while Riley Forte dished out two assists in the loss. Rudd caused two of Massachusetts' 19 turnovers, and Tierney, junior Tom Ford, senior Dominic Pryor and graduate student Michael Altmann all forced one turnover each. Senior Brian Herber went 16-29 at the face-off and led all players with nine ground balls. Redshirt senior Bobby Casey made seven saves and collected two ground balls in the loss.

Gabriel Procyk led the Minutemen in scoring with four goals, while Devin Spencer scored twice and assisted four times for six points. Matt Knote made 13 stops between the pipes for Massachusetts.

Hofstra returns to action on Saturday, April 3, as they host Towson at 12 p.m. The Pride are 27-23 all-time against the Tigers.
 
NOTES:
-Hofstra is now 21-26 all-time against Massachusetts.
-Ryan Tierney now has 151 goals and 224 points. He is 12 goals shy of breaking the Colonial Athletic Association record for career goals held by Delaware's Curtis Dickson (162, 2007-10) and is 24 points away from breaking the Hofstra career-goals mark set by Jerry Simandl (238, 1952-55).
-Lynskey's three assists ties a career-high for him, last set in 2019 against Brown while Lynskey was a member of Holy Cross.
-The Pride scooped up 28 ground balls to Massachusetts' 37, but outshot the Minutemen 37-34.