No. 14 Men’s Lacrosse Defeats Hofstra, 11-8

Saturday, February 28

Piscataway, N.J.

3:00 PM

Rutgers University

5-1

Hofstra

1-4

Hofstra

Rutgers

Feb 28 | Men's Lacrosse

Box Score Photo Gallery

RU Improves to 5-1 overall

PISCATAWAY, N.J. – Rutgers men's lacrosse earned their fourth straight win on Saturday afternoon at SHI Stadium. The Scarlet Knights defeated Hofstra by a final score of 11-8. to improve to 5-1 on the season in front of 902 fans at SHI Stadium. RU dropped Hofstra to 1-4 on the year with the victory. Rutgers has started the season with five wins in their first six games for the fourth time in the past five years.

With the win, Rutgers improved to 19-15 all-time against Hofstra, including four straight wins, having not lost to the Pride since 1999. RU is 13-6 against HU at home and have outscored them 55-33 over the last four games.

Rutgers saw Greyson Vorgang, Colin Kurdyla and Haydn Sommer each score two goals. Kasey Mongillo, Colin Zeller, Evan Large, Bennett Raphalian and Ben McKelvy had one goal apiece. Cardin Stoller had 12 saves.

Rutgers got out to an early 3-1 lead. The early highlight was the first career goal from defenseman Ben McKelvy, as he joined the attack in transition, scooped a loose ball and scored with the pole for the first goal in his five-year career. Colin Zeller put RU up 3-1, but Hofstra came back with the next two goals, and after one quarter, the game was even at 3-3.

RU came out with two goals just 36 seconds apart to take a 5-3 lead. Colin Kurdyla put RU back in front, then Greyson Vorgang absorbed contact and put home a goal for the 5-3 lead. Hofstra came back with a run, tying the game at 6-6 at the media timeout in the second quarter.

Each team had one more goal in them in the final 70 seconds of the opening half. After Hofstra took their first lead of the day at 7-6, RU used nifty passing to find Colin Kurdyla for his second goal of the game, which evened the score at 7-7 heading into halftime. Hofstra outshot RU 26-18 in the first half after winning 10-of-16 faceoffs, as RU faceoff specialist John Scarelli did not play in the first half.

Scarelli returned for the second half, and immediately provided RU with momentum, as the Scarlet Knights won the first two faceoffs, leading to goals from Kasey Mongillo and Bennett Raphalian, and taking a 9-7 lead. A bouncer from Haydn Sommer pushed the lead to 10-8, recording his second career multi-goal game after his hat trick last season in a win over Johns Hopkins. Scarelli won all five faceoffs in the third quarter as RU took the two-goal lead into the fourth. Evan Large put the final goal home, the only score in the fourth quarter to put the game away.

Rutgers wrapped up a three-game homestand with this one, winning its three games against Villanova, LIU and Hofstra. The team is on a four-game winning streak overall dating back to a road win at Stony Brook, and now heads on the road for the next two games. The Scarlet Knights will next play next Saturday against in-state rival and No. 7/10 ranked Princeton. That matchup for the Meistrell Cup starts at noon. Following that, RU has one more midweek game on Tuesday, March 10 at St. John's.

Gallery: (2-28-2026) Men's Lacrosse Defeats Hofstra