ALBANY, N.Y. – The 12th-ranked University of Pennsylvania men's lacrosse team had little trouble taking care of its own business on Saturday, romping past the University at Albany 19-11.
 
The day got even better a few hours later when the Quakers gained entry into next weekend's four-team Ivy League Tournament by virtue of Yale's 17-16 overtime win over Harvard in New Haven.
 
Penn ends the regular season at 8-4, while the host Great Danes fell to 5-9.
 
Quaker Notemeal
*For the third straight game, freshman Ben Smith established a season/career high with four goals. After scoring two goals total in Penn's first nine games he had two at Dartmouth, three against Saint Joseph's, and four on Saturday.
 
*Senior Ben Bedard entered Saturday's game with four goals on the season but scored four on Saturday which was a season/career high.
 
*Jack Schultz hadn't scored since April 2 at Yale, with a season high of two goals, but he had his first collegiate hat trick on Saturday with an assist.
 
*Three other players scored twice on Saturday: Dylan Gergar, Sam Handley and Tynan Walsh. Gergar also had three assists, while while Handley and Walsh had one each.
 
*Fresh off a five-point game on Tuesday against Saint Joseph's, Gabe Furey had a goal and two assists at UAlbany on Saturday.
 
*Penn had eight different goal scorers and ten different players had assists on Saturday; in all, the Quakers assisted 13 of their 19 goals.
 
*At the other end, Patrick Burkinshaw had 12 saves.
 
How It Happened
After sweating out a 13-12, overtime win on Tuesday against Saint Joseph's, Penn left little to chance. The Quakers scored the first three goals and went up 5-1 before the game was 11 minutes old. The Great Danes got within a goal midway through the second quarter, but Penn scored the last two goals of the half and then reeled off four of the first five in the third quarter to pull away.
 
James Shipley, whose goal ended Tuesday's win, got things started just 41 seconds into the contest, followed by Smith who had back-to-back goals 2:04 apart. UAlbany got one of those back, but Walsh and then Schultz scored 32 seconds apart and Penn was up 5-1 with four minutes still left in the first. The Danes scored twice, though, making it 5-3 after one.
 
Furey and Walsh scored 12 seconds apart in the first two minutes of the second to make it 7-3, and then 1:05 after UAlbany's fourth goal Gergar netted his first for an 8-4 Penn lead. However, the Danes got a trio of goals just 2:01 apart and it was 8-7 with 6:55 left in the second. Bedard scored the only two goals before halftime, the first with 4:47 left and the second with just four seconds before the buzzer to make it 10-7 at the break.
 
Handley opened the third-quarter scoring with a pair of goals 54 seconds apart, and then Gergar got back on the board posted his second of the day to make Penn's lead 13-7 with 10:45 left in the period. UAlbany got one of them back, only for Schultz to get it back two minutes later.
 
The Danes made it 14-9, only for Bedard to complete his hat trick to close out the third quarter. Penn then scored three times in a 2:13 span early in the fourth, and Schultz closed out a five-goal run that put the Red and Blue in front 19-9 midway through the period. UAlbany tacked on a pair of goals in the game's final two minutes, the second coming in the game's final second, to close things out.
 
Up Next
Penn will be the fourth seed at next weekend's Ivy League Tournament and face top-seeded and host Brown in Friday's second semifinal at 8:30 p.m., with Yale and Cornell meeting in the other semi at 6 p.m. Sunday's final will take place at noon in Providence. All three games will air on ESPNU.