Box Score Pleasantville, N.Y. – No. 17 ranked Bentley scored a season high 16 goals on Saturday, but fell on the road to No. 11 Pace 21-16.
Senior Alex Astarita (Bedford, N.H./Bishop Guertin), junior Matt Brooks (Brunswick, Maine/Phillips Exeter) and sophomore Joey Tesoriero (Huntington Station, N.Y./Half Hollow Hills) each had a hat trick. Senior Sam Hurley (Medfield, Mass./Medfield) had two goals and one assist to push him over the 100 career points milestone.
Early on the teams battled back and forth, with Pace just ahead 6-5 after the first quarter and 11-8 at halftime.
Bentley led 2-1 after four minutes, on the strength of goals by Hurley and a Michael Fricke (Highlands Ranch, Colo./Valor) man-up goal. The goal by Hurley was the 100th point of his career.
Bentley then led 3-2 after eight minutes after an Astarita goal. Pace responded with two straight to take a 4-3 lead with 4:44 left in the quarter, then each team scored twice before the period ended. Bentley's goals came from Tesoriero and Logan Walsh (Sandy Hook, Conn./Newtown).
The Setters scored two of the first three goals of the 2nd quarter to lead 8-6 with 8:45 remaining, but a 2-0 Bentley run tied the game, with the goals by Astarita and Brooks. The goal by Brooks tied it at 5:28. Pace though closed the half on a 3-0 run to lead 11-8 at the break.
Pace created some separation with four of the first five goals of the 3rd quarter, to lead 15-9 after six minutes played. Bentley responded with man-up goals by Tesoriero and Hurley to make it a 15-11 game with 6:18 left in the quarter. Tesoriero netted another man-up goal with 31 seconds left, but Pace still led 17-12 going into the final quarter.
The Falcons got to within 17-14 when they scored the first two goals of the 4th quarter. Senior Scott Carvalho (Wayland, Mass./Wayland) found the back of the net 34 seconds in, and Brooks 3rd goal of the day at 12:00 made it a three goal game.
But Bentley was unable to score again for about six minutes, and in that time Pace went on a 3-0 run to push its lead to 20-14 with just over 7:00 remaining. Kris Campbell (Longmeadow, Mass./Longmeadow) and Mark Galione (Ridgefield, Conn./Ridgefield) scored goals 18 seconds apart to get Bentley within 20-16 with 5:32 remaining, but couldn't any closer from that point.
The Falcons dropped to 8-4 overall and 6-4 NE10 with one game left, while Pace improved to 11-3 and 7-3.
Bentley now has one game left, with a playoff spot already clinched. They will close out the regular season on Tuesday night at home against AIC.
